CBS Expanding Star Trek TV Franchise; May Include Patrick Stewart Returning As Picard

This morning CBS announced they have extended Star Trek: Discovery executive producer Alex Kurtzman’s agreement with an exclusive deal through to 2023. The new deal with Kurtzman’s Secret Hideout production company will include Kurtzman, who just took over as Discovery’s showrunner, supervising what CBS is calling an expansion of the Star Trek franchise for television.

Heather Kadin and Alex Kurtzman (R) with now former Discovery showrunners Gretchen J. Berg Aaron Harberts at the Hollywood premiere (CBS)

Kurtzman’s 5-year mission

According to CBS, Kurtzman will be developing new Star Trek series, mini-series and other content opportunities, including animation. In addition to Star Trek, Kurtzman and an expanded Secret Hideout under president Heather Kadin will develop new, original series across the full spectrum of broadcast, cable and streaming platforms.

CBS Television Studios President David Stapf said in a statement:

“There is a very short list of writer-producer-directors that every film and television studio wants to be associated with, and Alex and his Secret Hideout team are always at the top. His talent, taste and ability to shepherd a successful project is unparalleled. Alex has done remarkable work for our Studio, dating back seven years to the launch of HAWAII FIVE-0, and we are thrilled that he, Heather and their team will be partnering with us for a long time to come.”

Kurtzman is also quoted in the same statement, with:

“Heather, Aaron and I are thrilled to continue Secret Hideout’s amazing partnership with CBS Television Studios. Since our first collaboration with HAWAII FIVE-0 almost a decade ago, Les, David and the full team at CBS Studios have been our foremost collaborators and champions, treating each project with integrity, supporting the creative visions and working breathlessly to make each episode of every show the best it can be. CBS has also allowed us the great pleasure of reintroducing the world of Star Trek audiences new and old, and we are very excited to keep working alongside them to expand that world.”

Star Trek: Discovery Executive Producer, Alex Kurtzman (CBS/Getty)

Multiple shows in development

The official announcement did not go into detail on what possible additional Star Trek content is in the works, but Variety reports some of the potential projects include the following:

  • A series set at Starfleet Academy from creators Stephanie Savage and Josh Schwartz. The duo most recently developed the CW’s reboot of Dynasty and previously created shows like Gossip Girl and Hulu and Marvel’s Runaways.
  • A limited series whose plot details are being kept under wraps.
  • A limited series based around the “Wrath of Khan” story. Khan’s full name is Khan Noonien Singh. He was famously portrayed by Ricardo Montalbán in both the original series episode “Space Seed” and again in the film Star Trek II: Wrath of Khan. Benedict Cumberbatch then played the character in the 2013 film Star Trek Into Darkness.
  • An animated series whose plot details are being kept under wraps.

The third item on that list related to Khan is likely the limited series that Wrath of Khan director Nicholas Meyer first spoke to TrekMovie about last summer, and recently said was on hold.

One potential new Star Trek show could involve Khan

Patrick Stewart returning as Picard?

An even more intriguing hint on what is in development comes from The Hollywood Reporter, with the unconfirmed report that there are “rumblings” which are “heating up” about a new Star Trek series “featuring Patrick Stewart reprising his role as Star Trek: The Next Generation‘s Captain Jean-Luc Picard.” According to THR, Akiva Goldsman, who was reported to have exited Star Trek: Discovery at the end of season one, is attached to the Sir Patrick Stewart project.

One bit of potential confirmation of this could be the intriguing hint Sir Patrick dropped last month when he said he may have good reason to start watching Star Trek: Discovery. At the time speculation was that he would possibly be doing a cameo, or just be looking forward to a potential guest spot from a former TNG co-star like Marina Sirtis, it could simply be that the former TNG star wants to get up to speed on the latest Star Trek and see what Alex Kurtzman has been up to, now that he is the new king of Trek on TV.

Patrick Stewart at 2018 Oscar ceremony, rumored to be returning to Star Trek

Trek is alive

With Paramount developing two Star Trek feature films and CBS developing multiple Star Trek TV shows, it looks like it is a good time to be a Trekkie.

TrekMovie will provide updates on all of these exciting projects as more information becomes available.

 

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THR also notes the possibility of a Patrick Stewart led series (or limited series).

I really doubt that.

Based on what? He’s shown a willingness to do television (he had a show on Starz that lasted two seasons from 2015-2016). He’s likely done with X-Men. I think it’s certainly possible if there’s a good idea and he liked the direction of any potential show.

Right, and there’s been a trend in recent years of old actors coming back to play their iconic roles one last time. So it’s definitely in the realm of possibility.

Ignore the troll.

Patrick Stewart has said before he would be willing to play Picard again if the idea was sound an it looks like someone was listening. ;)

I’m not going to get my hopes up yet, so far all of these just sound like ideas they are tinkering with but none of them green lit. I’m hoping (make that praying) we do get Picard back though. That would make me more excited than anything. But with the exception of Khan I’m open to all of these ideas.

Yes absolutely, Picard rocks.

Can we stop with the troll talk? Yeesh. Disagree, but enough with the name-calling.

I think it’s the nature of how one chooses to engage another over disagreements that defines trolling. Just my opinion.

@MattR — as long as it’s a RED or SPACE COWBOYS film-type approach I’d love to see that. Not really interested in seeing him as the Captain of a ship, and business as usual, but 18 years later. A limited series would be perfect — maybe an 8 episode mini-series about getting the band back together for one last mission only they can pull off for some reason (but don’t take themselves too seriously in the process). Count me in.

I like that idea. Engage!

I like that idea too CC!

I like it too. Then again I will take anything with the TNG or DS9 casts (and some Voyagers, you know who you are).

Yeah, I could get behind that if done right. Unite half a dozen or so from the casts of the 24th century shows in a mini series.. That maybe serves as a pilot for a 25th century show..?

If it’s Kurtzman who did Transformers Prime and Hawaii Five 0 we are in good shape. If it’s Kurtzman who did the Transformers movies and Into Darkness (poor Kahn abused by Starfleet) then it’s over. Transformers Prime was so well done as a serial arc that it’s worth a shot.

Dont forget the mummy 2017 and cowboys vs aliens. The man is a failure, keep him out of the 24th century and I am fine with it.

24th century Trek is so boring apart from DS9, they should do whatever it takes to stay away from that era.

Yes, you stay with your “happy” 23th century and let the “boring” 24th century alone.
You stay with Into Darkness I stey with The Best of Two..

Lol I am looking for more TWOK than Into Darkness. Into Darkness was a wasted opportunity. Could have been Kahn rediscovered is used by Starfleet to rebuild after the destruction of Vulcan and potential war with the Klingons – and only the Enterprise on the frontier discovers his galactic plot to take over the Federation! That was after Enterprise which should have been “can post WW3 primitive humanity put aside its differences, work with primitive technology and alien races to survive and explore the galaxy?” Instead in five minutes we got peace with the Klingons, phasers on stun and TNG Trek. Season three tried to fix it but too little too late.

I said again, you stay with Discovery and the guy that write The Mummy 2017, and I stay happy with Yesterday Enterprise, In the pale of the Morning, and Ronald D Moore. Do we have a deal?

In the Pale of the Morning is my absolute favourite. Amazing graphic novel.

Dude this Trek seems to only be in your head lol. And WW3 was literally centuries before, so why would that even matter?? Even for Enterprise WW 3 happened nearly hundred years prior. That’s like asking can we put aside issues with people we went to war with in WW2 and keep progressing? Clearly the answer is yes. I don’t think that’s an issue by the time TOS shows up.

Enterprise done right should have started pretty much right after First Contact.

OK I understand that reasoning.

Agreed.

TRUTH

Ugh… Hawaii 5-0 was garbage. I started watching it and bailed after 6 episodes. I would have bailed earlier but kept telling myself, “give it a chance… Give it a chance” Scorpion, with all its faults, is friggin’ King Lear compared to it.

If you liked the original Hawaii Five-0 then I think you’ll end up liking the reboot of Hawaii Five – o. It has good story arcs and the casting is excellent. The only problem I had with it is that they went to all the trouble to set up this evil governor arc and crime syndicates and then don’t really it take to a really cool conclusion, too much set up not enough delivery. I see that with Discovery, let’s spend hours setting up a Klingon war and then show no real strategic combat, no D-7 battle cruisers taking on Constitution class starships, no mass planetary invasions just hinted at, no real issues pertaining to the war (sacrifice, refugees, fall back from the frontier and leave colonists, dilithium crystal conflicts, violations of the Prime Directive, horrors of war, etc??), no dissention in the Federation ranks (are Vulcans and Andorians equally ok with the Starfleet battle plan), etc… isn’t that the whole point of spending hours starting the war?!?! Instead we got like a flash of a dilithium mine and Starbase one destroyed.

I do not recall much of the old Hawaii 5-0 show. Just the catchy theme. I was speaking of the reboot. Like the MacGyver reboot, Hawaii 5-0 was at best just another cop show. I actually gave 5-0 a better chance than Mac. Could only stomach 2 episodes of Mac before dumping on it. BTW… Unlike others I had no problem with the actor. I had a problem with how the show was set up and how it worked. It was insulting to the audience.

McGuyver I think is bad casting, you just don’t get the same “umph” from new McGuyver as the old (Richard Anderson just rocks, very commanding presence).I mean the guy from CSI has more presence than new McGuyver and that’s just not right (should have switched actors)

I disagree. I thought Lucas Till was good casting. That was not where the fault in the show was. It was they way it dumbed things down to the audience. Unless the show was indeed aimed at 7-8 year olds… Then it succeeded spectacularly.

Agreed, Lucas Till is just horrid and it really hurts the new series.

Borg/Klingon, so the fact that they treated the viewers like children was OK with you?

I have heard many claim the casting was bad but I think Till was fine. I suspect that those who didn’t like Till wouldn’t have liked anyone inhabiting the role who wasn’t Richard Dean Anderson.

I think the problem with that series is that it is philosophically not Macgyver. Now I haven’t watched the whole series yet, but Macgyver was always the smartest guy in the room, you could feel him thinking three-four steps ahead. With this Macgyver you don’t get that feeling. It looks too shallow, too dumbed down. In the original if I remember correctly, most of the Macgyverisms were actually based on some sort of truth, here they are just too over the top and oversimplified.

I grew up idolizing the old Macgyver show. Watched it religiously. I was actually in Manila last month and there was a channel showing MacGyver episodes. It really brought me back.

I have never seen the new show and zero interest to. Some things should just be left alone.

I’ll agree the show has other issues as well, including your point about it talking down to audience, but the poor casting of the main character was the deal-breaker for me.

I bailed on H50 in one of the first episodes where McGarrett & Co. sped through Honolulu with the bad guy strapped to the hood of their car. Yeah, right. [Changed channel.]

I got through halfway of season one. I wanted to like it, it just didn’t grow on me. I might give it another chance one day though since it seems really popular.

I wonder how long it will be until people start realizing that TV is different from movies. Kurtzman’s TV production has been good to great, his movies crappy. They are different mediums and it is clear he is good at one and not at the other.

Why not an animated TNG series?

Captain Pike on NCC 1701 series!!!

I would watch it because I’d be curious and, of course, I’m such a Trek nerd. But that is not the series I would go to. If I were doing a show set in the TOS era I would rather see it on a different star ship in a different part of the galaxy. What I would REALLY like to see is something set somewhere between TUC and TNG.

Could solve the problem of the TWOK uniforms being hard to replicate. By the time TUC rolled around, they were seriously running out of component. Hence Valeris’ mismatched uniform. But not a problem for animators.

I dont want a Picard writed by the guy behaind The Mummy 2017

bye

An animated series set after TNG and possibly overlapping with other Berman era 24th century shows could be a great premise for an animated show. I’d also like to see an animated series focusing on Kirk’s second 5 year mission.

I really like that idea. I didn’t watching Star Trek: The Animated Series until it was placed on Netflix (because I am too young to have seen it when it aired or in syndication) and was surprised how good it is and how much they could pack into a 30 min series. If they combined Enterprise E stories with the USS Titian stories I’d really something like that.

Agreed. I’d like to think that if the Picard led live action series also gets green lit that we’d also get to see Riker and the Titan.

God, that just sounds so delicious to me!

Riker and Titan! Make it so!

Only if Troi doesn’t come along for the ride.

Party pooper!

I’d be up for some Riker and Titan adventures too, if the Titan and other ships actually had proper sfx. I wonder, though, if Frakes is happier behind the camera than in front.

In general I think he is but I think he’d still jump at the chance.

My guess, the TOS:TAS upgraded with CGI to the standard of the TOS HD remaster. (I can dream).

Wow a five year mission of creating new Star Trek stories. Obviously Season 1 success of Discovery opened up a lot of eyes (and wallets) at CBS!!! And to satisfy those who hate streaming, it looks like some may even be back on broadcast tv. Maybe as someone has already suggested, there will be a Star Trek mini-series featuring the Enterprise and Captain Christopher Pike OR a TNG spinoff. So much to speculate on but no matter what, this is great news for fans!!

No wait, that can’t be the reason. After all Discovery was a financial and PR-disaster for CBS, was always in danger of being cancelled and has now finally been cancelled aka put on hiatus and Netflix has dropped out because of its awfulness, precluding any possibility of more Trek for the next ten years. Right? Right? ;-)

That’s a good point. A lot of negative people with egg on their face today.

” A lot of negative people with egg on their face today.”

If you mean people who were critical of STD I do not see how. The issues were with STD as a show. NOT with Star Trek as a franchise.

I think they mean those who said Discovery was a complete and utter failure from a financial standpoint have egg on their faces. Obviously this was not the case, as CBS not only approved season 2 for Discovery but has now also committed long term to many more Star Trek projects.

I’m not so sure. Obviously CBS sees a need for this but I think this is a reaction to what happened with CBSAA subscribers. Something I think was eminently predictable but the folks and CBS were not counting on. The 2nd season of Discovery I think was preordained. It was happening no matter what. I figured the 3rd season would be the shows first real test of renewal. I am also concerned with where the money for this will come from. Is Netflix a financial partner in this too? If STD was too much for CBS by themselves, then how can this commitment not be? This is encouraging news but there are still a lot of questions here.

That’s ridiculous. To suggest CBS was surprised that discovery attracted Trek fans who then unsubscribed when Trek was done. It happens on all streaming and premium mediums for popular niche shows. Of course they knew.

Securing the producer (and now lead creative person) of discovery to develop more content is absolutely an endorsement of discovery.

Jam, you misunderstand. Obviously they expected a certain amount of churn. But were surprised by how much of it actually happened. (wouldn’t be the first time media miscalculated the public behavior) The money to do this remains an issue. Does CBS still have Netflix as a partner here? Have they secured money from elsewhere?

@ML … because YOU know exactly how much of this happened. Actually far less that you actually think. If you take a look at the subscription numbers and the attachment rate that stayed… YOU would be surprised.

@Captain Ransom. Waht you say is interesting. I’d like to see that data. Could you point me in the direction where I might find those numbers?

I saw them in variety magazine a couple of months ago. I’m sure you can find them online somewhere too.

Thanks, I’ll have a search.

I never claimed to know. I was making a deduction based on what is and is not out there. It seems like it is YOU who are claiming to know how much of that happened. Hypocrite much?

ML… I posted my source. What’s yours? Your complete and utter dislike for the show? Do you base it on the fact that you think everyone feels like you do. Fanboy.

Sadly, your “source”, Captain, is not easily found. I just did a Google search and came up with nothing regarding what the true numbers are. Only guesses from outside sources. It very much sounds like you are saying what you HOPE is the case more so than an actual educated guess. Which is all everyone else outside CBS is doing.

If you took the time to actually read my posts you would not ask the questions you did.

ML did you even read my post? I never said I read it online. I said you can probably find it online. I subscribe to Variety Magazine, I’m in the industry. It was an article discussing how consumers are cutting their cable and satellites in favor of streaming services like cbsaa and netflix. The article mentioned how cbs is banking on shows like Discovery and Good Fight to bring people and and keep them with their cbs library and first run shows. They mentioned that there are people that subscribe for a show or two and them jump to another service for another show, but end up going back to catch a new season. Thy are finding that streaming services are slowing holding ono curent subscribers.

Yep, I remember reading that as well, and some others here even referenced that recently.

What you described, Captain, does not mean the churn was minimal. Nor does it really give you any insight into what it truly was. And, in fact, your final sentence is not supported by the ones that came before it. The opposite, in fact. Now, maybe it’s true but the data certainly does not lead that way.

ML, it perfectly relates. The article is cohesive and thorough. YOU do not support any of your claims. All you do is spout nonsense and feel just because YOU feel it is such that it must me true. Where is your data? What are your sources? Just because you think it, doesn’t make it real.

Capt, if it relates then you did not do a good enough job paraphrasing it so it would. Everything I have said was speculation based on what little has been made public. Which is exactly what you are doing as well. Further, not once have I ever claimed that my conclusions were indeed fact. In fact, in the very post you responded to I actually said, “maybe it’s true” in reference to your claim. Invalidating your theories.

You are not reading what you are responding to here. You referenced an article that supposedly had access to info that is not made available. It is reasonable to conclude that you may not be comprehending the full picture on this matter.

ML… You make no sense at all. You are making assumptions based on your dislike of the show. You are strapelating a conclusion based on your 9wn personal beliefs.
I understood the active in Variety perfectly. But your complete and utter dislike for Discovery, it’s producers and cbsaa skew your sense of anything. It is useless to try to reason with someone that is so blind. Do yourself a favor and just stop watching if you truly hate it. Problem solved. Let the rest of enjoy it without your whining.

No, I am making perfect sense. My personal opinion doesn’t enter into this at all. I’m only drawing from the facts that are out there. If you did indeed understand the article you read then you failed to paraphrase the reasons and conclusions very well as what you wrote did not add up. Notice that I did not claim the article was wrong.

Your response does nothing to support your point. All you did was make unsubstantiated claims that I was being ruled by emotion on the matter. (the irony there is not lost on me). Please, next time you post try and be a little constructive instead of being snarky. It works much better if you are looking to have an actual civil conversation.

Take care.

ML… Sorry, you have absolutely no facts to back up your emotional claims. Seriously, you write every post complaining about Discovery with emotional distaste and venom. No one takes anything you say seriously because of that. Like someone else said… You are just making shit up.

I do, but it makes sense that you don’t think I do since you have made it obvious you do not fully read and comprehend the posts you respond to. Nothing is being “made up”. We are both drawing conclusions from what is out there. Unlike you, I am not presenting my conclusions as fact. As you are. You have nothing. Hence your actions of taking this off topic trying to rattle me with inane comments that have nothing whatsoever to do with the topic at hand. It is the tactic of those who have nothing left. Let’s see if you are capable of responding without resorting to that. I think we both know what the answer there is…

He has no source, but he is not short on misdirection on fakey comeback one-liners that put you on the defensive to try to distract the fact that he is just “making shit up.”

The technical term for this would be, “I pulled it out of my keyster.”

“@ML … because YOU know exactly how much of this happened. Actually far less that you actually think. If you take a look at the subscription numbers and the attachment rate that stayed… YOU would be surprised.”

ML would never lets the facts get in the way of one his self-gratifying negative posts on DSC. ;-)

I do not present my personal opinion as “facts”. Also, the fact is unless you are privy to CBSAA’s numbers, no one here knows what the true figures are. BorgKlingon is guessing. Captain Ransom is guessing. ML31 is guessing. Of course, since my conclusions differ from yours you become fearful so you resort to juvenile comments like, ““I pulled it out of my keyster.” If that dissipates the insecurity then knock yourself out.

Did Les Moonves tell you that? You’re always making things up to push your anti-cbs agenda.

@ML31 Smells like rotten eggs around here.

Bingo.

Calling it a financial and PR-Disaster, and stating claims like it’s in danger of cancellation without having a clue is not being “critical” of the show. It’s pulling “facts” out of your ass because you personally don’t like something.
The fact that you still use STD instead of DSC which is the official usage says something about your “critical nature”

Noobcamper… Did you even read the post you are replying to? I never said anything about folks who were critical before seeing it or saying it was in danger of cancellation before one episode aired or streamed. I was only speaking about those who had legitimate criticisms of the series AFTER it was complete. Or did you accidentally reply to the wrong post?

I think Discovery was guaranteed an initially large audience just by virtue of being the first new Trek series in nearly a decade and a half. But there’s an immense amaount of negative criticism out there beyond this forum. ST Discovery season 1 audience ratings on Rotten Tomatoes show just 56% of the public liking it.. Also google Star Trek Discovery imdb user reviews, which are not pretty reading to be sure…

No one believes RT ratings on tv shows.

Yep. Internet popularity polls are not scientific polls, and provide no actual representative sample. They are junk.

@BK. I don’t trust polls either, full stop.. In this case though we are not talking about polls. They’re reviews.

No there just a bunch of sad losers that brigades an online poll.

No. They’re reviews. Suck it up ;-)

@ML31 You smell like eggs. LOL :)

Well said. The completely inaccurate spin @Kennelly spouted is just plain wrong.

Let’s not use STD please. DSC or DIS or ST:DSC.

Why? STD makes too much sense.

What’s wrong with STD?

Haha good one!! Oh well all the naysayers can have their opinions, some are even legit. That said, THANKS TO DISCOVERY!! The new show has opened the door to a legion of new fans while satisfying MANY Trek fans like myself and now there are going to be a whole plethora of new Star Trek projects. For the naysayers, I hope there is something in the new projects they can love – for me, I have really enjoyed watching Discovery over the past year and I can’t wait for season 2!!

I was just thinking the same thing Ken :)
The new one is “They only got season 2 because netflix paid for it”… Because netflix would pay for something that isn’t making them money right?

@Kennelly After the PR disaster that was the firing of Berg and Harberts, I can see why CBS rushed out an announcement like this. (And who said Netflix dropped out?) At the moment, if they don’t execute these projects correctly, there will be more disaster to come… I sincerely hope that it not the case.. guess time will tell.

dprescott,

No one has said Netflix has dropped out. I was merely wondering if they were still involved in all this new stuff. It was not included in the article.

Ok gotcha. I must’ve missed the comment. Fair speculation..

I personally would rather any new Trek be on CBS over the air television. But I am doubting that will be the case anymore. This feels like CBSAA my be turning into the Star Trek Streaming Service as it seems that is the only thing people subscribed for. Which I guess is both good and bad. All we can do is hope things work out for us consumers.

You’ve long been critical of streaming and CBsAA. I’d counter with the likelihood this isn’t Happening if cbsaa didn’t exist. The economy of streaming is different and is what allows this.

If Trek had to survive on cbs network it likely doesn’t happen at all.

Indeed, CBSAA will effectively become The Star Trek Channel if all of what the article states actually comes to pass.

We’ll have to wait and see if Kurtzman as the new Berman can pull this off. I hope he can.. But it does seem to me CBS are pinning their hopes of making a success of their All Access project on new Trek, and are gonna milk the cash cow for all it’s worth, oh dear.
2 years ago this announcement would have had me excited.. but Discovery has happened.. Surely it would be better to make a show that exists in it’s own right first, rather than all this heavy dependence on classic continuity. When they get that right then congratulate themselves and look at spin offs.
As for the credentials being cited for some of the people involved (“The duo most recently developed the CW’s reboot of Dynasty and previously created shows like Gossip Girl”).. for me, it doesn’t inspire confidence…

I took that to mean that a Starfleet Academy show would likely be targeted at teenagers.

@The Recursion King — if that’s true, CBS could do worse than to put it on the CW to draw a new young audience, as WB currently does with all of its DC properties.

Hope that the leave the 24th century alone, they are not worth it of it. Keep ruining the 23th century and keep runing Khan.. leave Picard and company alone.

Hope they reboot the 24th to match Discovery’s style. TNG looks like crap now.

TNG is the best looking of all ‘Trek series, best stories, best characters, most awards.. The list never stops.

That’s subjective. The best characters and stories are still found on TOS and DS9 from the perspective of many. And I personally think Enterprise looked the best but they had the advantage of being the most modern.

Most of the worst stories were found on TOS. No wonder the show got cancelled.

HN4, does that stand for Hopeless Neurotic by any chance? Your constant trolling isn’t winning you any friends. It just makes you come across as a complete loser!

Friends? I have no friends. Hunted… despised… living like an animal. The jungle is my friend! But I will show the world that I can be its master. I shall perfect my own race of people… a race of atomic supermen that will conquer the world!

I think a bad guy already beat you out on that ‘conquer the world’ part.

Who?

Hands down TNG is the best (Though I adore DS9)! TOS started it all and the trio is EVERYTHING but some of those episodes are sexist AF and even hard to watch they are of offensive. (The idea that in the 23rd century women can’t be captains, come on) TNG from session three on is one of the best shows ever to bless the airways! But this is a debate that can go on and on…

DS9 is my favorite. TNG is my second and TOS is my third. You’re not wrong about the sexism stuff but yeah it was made in the 60s. It was still pretty forward thinking given the time.

I appreciate TNG for what it did for Trek. But I do not consider it to be a very good Trek series. TOS and DS9 were tops for me. I think the Turnabout Intruder episode was retconed to mean that Janice Lester couldn’t be a captain because she mentally couldn’t handle it. It’s one of those canon things that just doesn’t work for the 23rd century (much less the late 20th)

Thats fine, everyone has their favorites and non-favorites. I have said countless times not everyone has to like EVERYTHING Trek produces, all that matters is there is something for everyone.

Which is why its sad for people to get into constant fights over it. Its all Star Trek, its all canon and it all matters, period. I may not love all the shows, but I recognize they have their fans and should be respected as such.

I don’t think I have ever ripped on someone directly for liking something I don’t. I have defended my opinions and I guess that might sometimes sound like I’m saying they should see things my way. But it is never my intent. Sometimes things I think are self evident are not to some.

No I’m not saying you I’m just speaking in general. But yes what REALLY irks me is the ‘you’re not a real fan if you like such and such show/film’. Shut up please, stop being a gatekeeper. I don’t hear that much talk around here like I use to but other places its especially toxic. Youtube is the worst of that because none of those comments are regulated.

Its certainly fine to argue why you think one show or film is better than another. Debate is great, its just when some of the more obsessives takes it too far or think they speak for the entire fanbase. No you don’t, stop pretending like you were the only one who grew up with a television.

The idea that in the 23rd century women can’t be captains, come on
–Andrew SD

One way to look at that line from TURNABOUT INTRUDER is that Starfleet Captains have no room for relationships; and because she is a woman, she phrases it that way. While they likely meant is as most take it, it absolutely can mean the other — especially considering how many times we’re told Kirk’s married to the Enterprise, over any other relationship he has.

TNG the Best looking? Maybe if your on PCP while you watch it.

Well said Athus, I hope they leave the 24th century alone too, they really aren’t worthy of it. He actively hates the rich 50 year legacy of the previous series. He needs to go away.

Athus, your tears are delicious.

25th Century could be great.. maybe the Patrick Stewart angle hints at that.. I was beginning to think maybe the Movie people were jealously guarding the rights to post Nemesis storytelling on screen..

I would love a 25th century show. I keep hearing from people how ‘impossible’ it is to make a post-Nemesis show interesting while avoiding the fact there have been countless Star Trek novels and an online game that has been doing just that for years. And not only that, apparently the novels have been considered pretty good.

Clearly people can imagine how a Star Trek story will work in a later future just fine, they been writing those stories for years. In fact one of the writers on Discovery got the job because of how good her Voyager novels have been whose stories happens after the show ended.

Just because YOU can’t come up with anything interesting for a post-Nemesis time period doesn’t mean professional writers can’t.

I have a hard time believing most professional writers actually can. We live in an age of taking the easy way out and of dumbing down stuff and of nothing original. I can’t remember the last thing that I watched that was fully original and that awed me. I think it might have been Angel Heart and that is a film 30 years old. In short yes I agree with you that Trek needs to move forward, but unfortunately I can’t see any modern writers capable of doing this. They don’t want to get out of their comfort zones.

@Tiger2. Good points.

I think the ideas are there. But I agree the courage to express those ideas may be lacking. And then beyond the effort it takes to sell an original idea, it has to pass other criteria with regard to ‘dumbing down,’ addressing tone, demographics, the possibility of offending ever-growing leagues of groups and organizations and sadly, even vocal individuals. How the message is perceived by the masses these days is sadly more important than the message itself, it seems to me. To the point where the once-original story is so watered down it’s just easier to go with a limp re-tread. An example of excellent ‘sci-fi’ writing today is The Handmaid’s Tale, imo. That is one tight show. The talent is out there, we just need it for Trek.

Well sure but you can say that about any Star Trek story regardless of period. I mean look at Discovery, it hasn’t presented any new or innovative ideas in terms of science fiction that we haven’t seen over and over again with the exception of the spore drive technology. Oddly enough a concept that doesn’t really belong in this period BUT proof they can think outside the box at least.

So yes I don’t disagree but if the issue is that ideas may be disregarded or have to fit a certain criteria to get approved my guess is that’s probably been happening to Trek literally since TOS anyway. Its no secret Roddenberry had a more cerebral take on the show but that was constantly being dumb down because the network wanted a more action adventure series not to mention at the time the stories pitched for TOS were probably considered highly controversial and rejected being the 60s. But a lot of terrific ideas still came out of it even if he was forced to make it more mainstream.

The thing is with TOS the terrific ideas did come through most of the episodes despite the network insistence on dumbing the show down. With Discovery I rarely see these ideas come through. So what I am saying is that if you really try it you can have a show that has thoughtful ideas and that can be entertaining at the same time. Star Trek was the best at doing this, but unfortunately I can’t see this too much with Discovery. The show is certainly entertaining, but you have dig through with a shovel to get to all the ideas it is trying to convey.

Hmmm I’m skeptically optimistic, I mean IF this is true (which I hope it is as most want a post-TNG era show) you need people in charge who understand that time period. Is Alex Kurtzman a big enough fanboy to “get” the Berman era TREK? The continuity was far more integrated between TNG, DS9 and VOY. Will he have people onboard that can truly continue on where the best years of Trek ended? I hope so, I really do hope so.

I do wonder though, if they’re rushing this through as leverage against Paramount and the merger shenanigans? If they’re bringing in Picard, why not go the whole hog and bring back Janeway and possibly even Sisko? Maybe all the captains, for a multi-era time travel-centric mini series. Who knows, but Discovery has left me rather nervous continuity wise, both visual and narrative. Now they want to play in my favourite time period? I pray it works, I really do. Time will tell.

Frakes may be the guy to do it

Obviously. His involvement with Disco is the only thing giving me hope for the new Picard show.

Yeah, Frakes is great, he really knows what he’s doing.

Visual continuity needed to be updated, personally, I like the direction they went. It looks like a realistic representation of the future from 2017/2018’s standpoint, and has enough call backs to know it’s trek. I get how some people won’t like it, but I am glad they did as it has more of a chance to bring in new Trek fans (which Trek needs badly if it wants to stay).

Narrative wise, I haven’t seen anything that actually breaks canon. I see the argument for the spore drive, but there is the argument that it’s only on one ship, and has now been deemed too dangerous to use. Think of it like the omega molecule, except in that case, they needed a directive in place to destroy the molecule, and only Captains and higher actually knew of it’s existence. Something they wouldn’t really need for the spore drive, as the spores by themselves don’t pose a threat.

Yeah those Klingons look great and that ships spot on.. Not

The Klingons in Discovery were not an update, they were an entirely reimaging. So insulting to the amazing evolution and journey they took. I want to throw up reading this news. Kurtzman is going to completely disregard everything fans of TNG, DS9 and VOY love. He doesn’t get the style or the tone. They should be modernizing Trek and improving upon it, not reinventing the wheel.

I have half a feeling that since Kurtzman rebooted Hawaii 5-0, it was okay to reboot Trek in a similar way.. Come on Kurtzman, spill your beans, we need to know..

Obviously we don’t know what level Picard will be used if he’s used at all. But my guess is there will be more writers brought in obviously and maybe it will be some who worked on TNG (of course they HAD one who worked on it but he bailed to Orville this year, probably due to all the show runner issues). I have given Kurtmam credit many times for trying to bring in past Trek writers, sadly it just didn’t work as we all thought but I can see him doing it again for the new shows.

But this will open up a lot of possibilities. Hopefully we will get a post-24th century show again and honestly where they should’ve put Discovery.

“A series set at Starfleet Academy from creators Stephanie Savage and Josh Schwartz. The duo most recently developed the CW’s reboot of “Dynasty” and previously created shows like “Gossip Girl” and Hulu and Marvel’s “Runaways.” Geared towards teens obviously, which would make sense for the future of the franchise.

The proposed Khan series doesn’t interest me whatsoever, but otherwise, should be interesting to see what they come up with. Like I said when they announced Discovery, please just respect what came before (and they didn’t, imo).

As far as leaving previously-shown eras and incarnations alone, good luck with that. I’d say everything is pretty much up for grabs now. They’re going to Disney/Marvel the sh*t out of this franchise.

” I’d say everything is pretty much up for grabs now. They’re going to Disney/Marvel the sh*t out of this franchise.”

Yes, that is exactly what this is sounding like. They can have multiple shows going on in multiple time periods and even alternate universes. There might even be so many shows going on that there could be something for everyone. Don’t like STD? Try Starfleet JAG or this animated Picard show or this MU set show or this one set on board a Klingon ship… Lot’s of possibilities.

I still say Starfleet Criminal Investigative Service should be a natural for CBS, then do a time travel episode to get Mark Harmon as a guest.

Starfleet Law & Order, might have mileage.

The Starfleet Academy idea NEVER interested me to be honest, but I would take that 100 times over than a boring Khan redux any day. I was really hoping that idea was dead in the water. Guess not.

Starfleet Academy never interested me either. But I guess I’m outside the demographic that show might be striving for. For me, at least, for such a concept to work we could not follow the characters once they are gone. Every year some of them graduate and we get new actors as freshmen. Not sure how the network types would feel about such an annual cast turnover. Can you imagine? DeGrassi in Space!

I have a feeling the Academy show would follow first year cadets so we would see them for four years minimum. I think your idea would be interesting but that’s what is interesting about Star Trek, once they have a cast they seem pretty bent on keeping them and another reason why I think they weren’t into the anthology idea.

That said though its not like they can’t add cast members as they go. But yes part of me is afraid it would be a teenagers in school soap, just Star Trek style. That seems to always be the fear of doing it but they could definitely do something more high brow with it. I just don’t know if they will.

They have been trying to do this Starfleet Academy idea since Star Trek 6, and I don’t get the appeal of it as well. There will be hardly be any exploration in this series, are we supposed to watch teenage angst and girlfriend/boyfriend troubles of Starfleet cadets? If so, then I’ll pass. I want more meat and bones in my science fiction.

Me neither! And yes it was Harve Bennet who came up with that idea for Star Trek 6. I’m really happy the studio didn’t go for that idea at the time but I think mostly because they were afraid of doing a movie with all new actors subbing for the original cast.

But I agree I don’t get the appeal either and yet it seems to be one of those ideas that someone keeps bringing up. And now it looks like it finally has got enough traction where its in development stage at least.

I really, really, really, really hope they don’t do it. Its funny no one here seems overly excited about it because over 200 posts so far I don’t think anyone has entertained the idea of it or made any suggestions of how they like to see it done. There seems to be more interest in the animation show than this.

That’s basically my reaction, too. That said, one thing that has made me reconsider, at least partially, is the success of Harry Potter. Harry Potter could very well have been a “teen angst” concept, and little more, but JK Rowling made it into something more: an allegory for the rise of fascism. (The rub, of course, is that not every writer is a JK Rowling.)

@The River Temarc — yes, that’s exactly what they will do. Take a look at the CW’s programming slate. RIVERDALE in particular. DC has rebooted many of its big super hero franchises for a young adult audience, targeted at Millennials and Gen Z. RIVERDALE in particular is actually about High School kids, and does an amazing job of being watchable by adults, but has captivated the under 20 crowd very effectively — so effectively that they are already spinning of SABRINA for her own 22 episode series on Netflix. This is what every franchise wants to grow fans for the next generation. And moreover, this approach also has the potential to bring in a much larger female audience at a much earlier age than Star Trek ever has.

And also consider that since TNG, Trek has made an effort to include young recurring characters likely for precisely this reason. Wesley. Nog & Jake. Naomi & Icheb. All to attract a more inclusive audience, and give younger audiences members characters with which to identify. This is really just a reverse concept where the younger characters outnumber the older ones.

I gotta check out Riverdale then, but one thing I don’t like about the CW’s superhero shows that while they are good in principle, they don’t use their older characters as much as I would like them to. I think a more equal balance between the young and old characters should be more effective. If done well, this concept can work, but I am not sure if the current generation of writers can make it work. But I still want a more pure science fiction show in the Trek universe, I don’t think Starfleet Academy can be this show.

I actually thought the take on Riverdale had potential. Now I know it is not aimed at me but I found the entire show to be… Lacking. First, I have always had a tough time with 26 year olds playing 14-16 year olds. I know why they do it but it RARELY looks correct. And on top of that, I just found the entire thing dull. Stopped watching after 4 episodes. I do think, however, that their Arrowverse is done quite well. Arrow I think has gotten a little tired but The Flash is still going strong. I’d say Supergirl is the weakest link in the Arrowverse, however.

Academy could be pretty interesting. It’s not my least favorite Star Trek concept. Better than Ceti Alpha V, Captain Sulu Adventures, or Star Trek: Klingons!

Agreed on all those fronts.

The Starfleet Academy and Khan ideas don’t interest me in the least. The Picard possibility is intriguing. Hopefully some more interesting ideas will surface as this process grows. The Romulan War, a series filling the 90 year gap between TUC and TNG, a post-Nem series. Since I’ll be (a young, imo) 52 this year, anything geared towards teens I’ll likely give a pass. I tried Star Wars Rebels for a bit, but found it too juvenile for my tastes now (and I thought the animation sucked). Those of us ‘older’ fans need to understand a lot of what’s coming is likely not going to be geared towards us, which is the way of things. It will be fun to have options, though.

If all the in-development shows mentioned bear fruit, then CBS will have effectively doubled the number of Star trek series in one fell swoop.. Not bad, but look how fatigued things were by the time Enterprise limped across the finishing line with that Holodeck episode..

But there was a lot of other factors going on there, mostly that by the time Enterprise ended, there was a total of 18 NONSTOP seasons of Star Trek. People who watched the first season of TNG as a kid literally had their own kids by the time Enterprise ended lol. Thats a loooooong time. And not only that because there was just so many episodes with each show. TNG still has the most produced episodes out of all them with 178 after 7 seasons. Even if Discovery manages to get to 7 seasons, it won’t even get to a 100 episodes.

And all the shows so far sound like they are going to be in the 8-10 episode range. CBS produces over 70 episodes of three NCIS shows EVERY year. Yes you read correctly and they are all big hits! Not only that the original show is now in its 15th season. They look at that and think if they can get enough people to tune in to 70+ episodes of the same franchise year after year for over a decade then there shouldn’t be a problem to get people to turn into multiple Star Trek shows every year (although I’m guessing the number of people watching are WAY lower lol).

I really do believe there was fatigue by the time Enterprise showed up. BUT I also believe if the show was simply more liked at the time it would’ve easily gotten enough people to watch for another 7 seasons just the same. But there was going to be a drop off regardless.

But we live in a different age now, people have to recognize that. MCU not only makes three movies a year, there are now roughly 10 TV shows scattered all across networks and online. The overwhelming majority of it has been big hits. Every TV show has been renewed at least once with the exception of Inhumans. There are people out there that watches every movie in the theater and watches every TV show weekly. Thats why franchises are so popular, once you get people loyal enough to a brand you can get them to watch as much as you produce for years on end for every medium. Star Trek proved that long ago.

If the new shows will be part of the new visual updated DSC universe ,with the new bald monkey-klingons ,then this news is a real nightmare.

For you maybe, but we all know you will still watch and pretend to hate it.

I agree Marian! It’s scary news – Kurtzman goes out of his way to disregard the wonderfully rich 50 year legacy we all love so much. There was no reason to selectively ‘reimagine’ the Klingons – just to flex their muscles and say ‘we can’. The visual updates of Discovery are an insult to Trek’s iconic history. Should of been handled in the way Disney has respected the style and tone of Star Wars, instead Kurtzman behaves like he’s embarassed of the franchise.

I don’t know if people can blame Kurtzman directly for that though. I really feel its CBS telling them to make the show feel and look different from the others. Of course if true that probably doesn’t make you feel any better lol (it doesn’t me as well) but I think CBS just wants Discovery to look and be its own thing. The problem of course is it feels disconnected from everything else that came before it.

But as I been saying it DOES look like they are trying to reconcile some of that next season as they said they would, the TOS uniforms being a big indication in that direction. Guys I am as critical of this show like anyone but I also say lets see what they do next season before people write the whole thing off. EVERY Trek spin-off had a shaky start, they all got better IMO. Maybe this will too.

Kurtzman will not be able to manage this on his own, believe me. He will need a Michael Piller of his own..

Good googly moogly! STAR TREK LIVES!

The two new movies plus these new Star Trek television projects will take us to the eve of the 60th anniversary of the production date of The Cage. I wonder if Gene ever thought his creation would prosper like it has!!??

Well, if you do anything with the heart and message of Trek, it will continue for many more years after the 60th.

Looks like the 90s are repeating itself with multiple shows on air and films. THIS is what makes me excited as a Trek fan. I just want more and more!

Same here! Give me more. Want to be rolling on the floor fat full of Star Trek. LOL

LOL me too man! If they approved all four shows I will watch them all, even the ones I don’t love the idea of (ie Khan).

The last Trek movie underperformed… bigly.. Hard to understand why the studio would invest so heavily in two more…

More precisely, it underperformed, but mildly, and in a summer when nearly all movies underperformed. It was hardly an unmitigated disaster.

Picard back on television? This is a DREAM COME TRUE!! Then why am I filled with dread? Do the producers realize the jewel they’ve been entrusted with? Is this just another job to them? I wish I had some way of knowing.

Never mind Picard, I’m just worried about how Worf is going to turn out!! In all seriousness though I’m excited about this. If you think about it if they didn’t bring back Picard his swansong would be Nemesis, at least this way we have a chance of getting a more fitting end to his story.

Michael Dorn is very protective of that character, I have a feeling if he doesn’t like the designs he will let them now.

You know most of us were fine accepting that Klingons looked different because of make up limitations and a 60’s TV budget and then DS9 and Enterprise went along and canonised the fact that they did look different. It’s my hope that when we do see Klingons in the post Nemesis shows that they’ll be based on the TNG look and that the Explanation of the DSC versions is that they are respecting canon by acknowledging that Klingons did look different whilst accepting the reality that 60’s TV make up and prosthetics budgets really were limited!

LMAO Worf as a Disco Klingon!!

Barf.

Images on google for this search are very disturbing.

They only put buckets of makeup and prosthetics on the Klingons so you wouldn’t realize Ash was VOQ. Really paid offf eh?
Like no one totally figured that out and it was SUCH a big reveal.

Sigh.

Part of me still thinks the main reason for the Klingon redesign was just to hide Ash. Which was still dumb on so many fronts. The least of which was they did NOTHING with the Ash story anyway…

Cough.. 25% different.. cough.

The 25% never felt real when I first heard it and then it got officially debunked. Further, the Vulcans weren’t 25% different….

No problem with that, but I think you know already, I believe it. It would be a PR disaster if cbs had to admit they didn’t have the rights to make Trek as we knew it, even if they wanted to. I suspect the rights are hopelessly mixed up between cbs and viacom.. Time will prove me right or wrong..

I think so too. Hopefully they will retcon this with the post NEM show.

Post Nemesis is what I would like to see, indeed..!

Honestly there is now no excuse not to make a post Nemesis show. The 23rd century fans sounds like they will get at least one or two more shows in that era. I think ONE post 24th show would be the right direction to go in for no other reason it would separate the herd a bit at the rate they are going.

We have to remember too they DID ask Dorn to be in the Discovery pilot and he turned them down. We really don’t know the reason, it could be anything from money to little screen time. But yes it could also be how he would look as a Klingon. Its hard to say.

How should his story end? Playing poker?

@Corinthian7 — somehow I think Worf is done. He almost wasn’t in ALL GOOD THINGS’ future timeframe from a story standpoint, had they not needed him to get into the Neutral Zone, and even then, he came into that storyline very late in the game. I hadn’t really thought about him in my RED/SPACE COWBOYS concept, but he’d be appropriate as he spanned two major series as a primary character. And it’d be a problem with redefining his look, as he was only ever depicted in that makeup (even though it changed fairly dramatically from the early episodes). As a returning character it’s hard to imagine changing the way they looked, any more than had they changed up Nimoy’s look as a Vulcan in ST09 (had they given Vulcans forehead ridges like the Romulans). That said, I still take them at their word — we’ve only seen a small slice of Klingons so far, and just as there are many different looking humans, there should likely be many different looking Klingons. Worf could be one of those we just haven’t seen yet. But a show centered around Picard, does not necessarily mean all the other characters from TNG will be there as well. Data is another problem character to have Spiner reprise him, and one who would be sorely missed if it’s a get-the-band-back-together type episode. So I wouldn’t’ expect to see him, nor do I expect it will be that type of series.

@Curious Cadet I think in season 2 of DSC we will see further attempts to reconcile some of the aesthetic choices they made with the more established look of the previous shows and movies. I think we’ve seen some evidence of this already with the ‘TOS’ style uniforms being introduced. Like you say we’ve only seen a small slice of the Klingon population so far and the writers have acknowledged that they want to show Klingons as a diverse species. Are they actually all hairless for example or is that just the common style of the time period? Might we be introduced to more traditional Klingons that sport hair? Maybe they’re frowned upon because they’re associated with a particular philosophy or interpretation of the teachings of Kahless much like the mindmelding Vulcans we had come to know were outcasts at the time of Enterprise. Now we’ve all seen the various photoshopped images of DSC Klingons sporting Hair and they’re not a million miles away from what we expect from that species. Couple this with the fact that it’s not unprecedented for a lead actor playing a character that is hidden under a lot of latex to have a distinctive look from the rest of their race to make them identifiable and Worf’s return is not necessarily a problem. I realise that when they did this with Armin Shimmerman that the differences were much more subtle but I still think we could have a Worf that still looks like Worf albeit with more modern make up whilst not completely disregarding the changes they made for the new show.

Data is slightly more problematic as no amount of make up is going to make him look 30 years younger. I don’t know a lot about CGI but I would imagine that the cost of de-aging him would be high and potentially prohibitive on a TV show budget but I guess I could be wrong. Using the All Good Things example you mentioned it’s worth noting that Data had made efforts to look older and more distinguished in that timeframe so I guess they could go down that route. A couple of lines of dialogue with the old gang when they’re catching up could solve that problem and could be a nice nod to the TNG finale.

First, we have seen representatives from multiple houses. They ALL sported the “crystal skull” look. I think it safe to conclude that in STD, the typical Klingon has that sort of head and face. The traditional ridged Klingon does not exist in the STD universe.

Next, I do think the days of Spiner playing Data on camera are long gone. He can do a voice on an intercom (as he did on “These are the Voyages”. Or in an animated show. And I believe Spiner confirmed this himself. An actor who ages just has a tough time continually playing a character who does not.

Stick hair on some of those Klingons and they don’t look that different. Once you’ve got a barnet on them it’s just a case of tweaking the make up and prosthetics on Worf so that it meets DSC somewhere in the middle. If they bring back Worf and want him to look familiar they can do so easily and still have it fit within the overall aesthetic of the show. It’s not like Worf’s forehead and make up hasn’t changed before. It all comes down to whether they want to do it or not but if they did then it wouldn’t be that difficult to create the appropriate conditions for it. The same goes for Data, if they want him in it they’ll put him in it. Given that they’ve completely overhauled the look of Klingons and expected fans to roll with it then I don’t think they’d let a factor like Spiners age prevent him from being cast. Like I said there’s already in universe explanations for him potentially aging and it could easily be written off with a brief bit of dialogue.

I really doubt that. No one cares about that lame 90’s look.

Yes I never really considered Picard and the gang could be back. I mean its Hollywood anything is possible, Rosanne came back (briefly ;)) but I was convinced they moved on from all the old actors. But yeah its exciting news if we get him back. My god!

Hope Picard comes back as a racist.

Hope you return to this site as a reformed character!

And he’s married to a Ferengi woman

A strange choice of partner for a racist.

That’s the twist. It will make a great sitcom. Like Roseanne.

My immediate reaction is this is not a good thing for Star Trek. I’d like to have a better more creative person in charge. The flip side is they could do a lot worse. Kurtzman’s TV work has been OK at best. Terrible at worst. (sigh)

You are the dude who complains about the brand of chocolate than Santa left you in your stocking. LOL

LOL Santa left him some egg on his face. That guy needs to grow up.

Star Trek is a cbs property. More Trek content is good for cbs.

More Trek can’t be bad for Trek. Besides bad robot lowered the standard anyway. All is well.

“Besides bad robot lowered the standard anyway.” Well put, JAM. Can’t go back…

If you are looking at lowering the bar then you can’t go lower than Discovery. The good news is it will be difficult to do much worse.

Blah blah blah… i hate it… blah blah… complain complain… blah blah… discovery sucks blah blah…
ML the broken record…

LOL

I believe that many people did feel there was too much of it by the time Enterprise came on. Even I stopped watching that show because it didn’t wow me. But in hindsight I REALLY regretted it because it did get better. I have a LOT of issues with Discovery but I have said from day one I will support it because I want Trek to thrive and I want it to be successful enough to get us more shows.

I have said that over and over again because I just love Star Trek and I don’t want it to be an issue where the show is cancelled by third season and we are left with another decade without a show.

This could be a good thing though. I know how people feel about Kurtzman I been on the fence with him for years but for me I have always wanted more Star Trek than less Star Trek. I wasn’t happy about Discovery’s premise and still not totally happy with season one but I do see potential there. And whats funny is I remember in the other thread saying I still have All Access (even though I haven’t watched it since the finale) because I want them to be successful enough to put another show on. I know how you feel about AA and all of that but my feeling is Star Trek will only be made through streaming because there are more advantages putting it there than traditional TV.

But if it just get us Khan or the Academy show I WON’T be happy but I’m not going to be cynical until we know where all of this is going. A few days ago I was worried the Discovery drama may put them off to developing anything else for awhile but now to get this news is a welcome relief.

Yes, I am aware that streaming is the only place where something as niche as Star Trek can basically have a whole service devoted to it. Even cable couldn’t do that. DC is trying it with their streaming service. Something tells me that ultimately I will end up paying more for my TV service than I ever did before down the line.Which I guess is the point.

I don’t think Star Trek can’t survive on a network. It survived on one for 11 seasons with Voyager and Enterprise but I think the amount of money it cost to make a show like that the networks would expect stronger ratings and its just probably a better choice today for it to be on a streaming site.

I had no idea DC was attempting to do a streaming site but yes this is the future. Now that Disney is attempting it, its only going to encourage everyone else to go this direction. And we know Disney’s site is going to be a HUGE hit. I mean All Access is one thing but the company that can give people endless Pixar, Star Wars, Animated movies and Marvel films not to mention 70 years of everything else that company has made is going to shake the tree like we never seen before. And if Disney really does get their hands on 20th century Fox they just added another $2 a month to the service lol.

But I really don’t fear the costs that much. My guess is this will simply create more competition and cable will have to compete and lower prices as well. Look at Direct TV for example. They are now doing Direct TV now which is waaaaaay cheaper because its now basically a streaming service and no hardware. 60 channels for $35 a month, that’s pretty good and honestly all I would even need looking at what’s included minus a few channels. And because stuff like HBO and Showtime now have their own separate streaming site its even easier to go that direction.

But I know the technology is still not that great, which is why I’m not cancelling my satellite plan just yet. But the thing is as MORE companies get into streaming more will devote themselves to improving it once they expect people to pay for it. I mean honestly Youtube is probably the best streaming site out there in terms of buffering issues and its FREE! Not only that but it easily has the biggest audience watching it because its free. If that site can figure it out then in time these others can too.

My big concern with the cable streamers, like DTVNow, is what about DVR service? Can I still record and FF the commercials like I do with my DVR? Thus far for streaming FF and RW still don’t work well at all. And many of the network streaming sites FORCE the commercials on you. The older I have gotten the more I just can’t stand watching commercials. I even watch less sports now than I used to because of the commercials. Except football/soccer. Which I am watching more of BECAUSE there are no commercials in game. The World Cup is still a great event even with no USA in it to cheer for.

Thats actually a good question. I don’t know. My guess is though you can probably download shows at least. What’s odd about Netflix and Amazon is that they now let you download shows on your phone but you can’t do it on your computer or laptop.

But then maybe you can’t download because you have to think about the commercials which netflix and amazon that isn’t an issue.

With streaming services it is not an issue. But if DTVNow is streaming cable programming to you, I wonder if I cannot record, “Humans” from AMC for example, on their streaming service? If I can, can I still zip through the commercials? If the answer for either question is “no” then streaming cable is still not a viable option.

I agree ML31. If it was someone with some good work behind his belt, I would feel excited – but Kurtzman is awful and his choices on Discovery have been insulting to the universe we love. I feel so fed up with where Trek is heading. They doesn’t understand the style or tone of the franchise – I watch Discovery and I could be watching anything. Trek only in name.

I always thought the Trek ‘elephant in the room’ was a series picking up after the 24th Century shows. Star Trek has been ‘filling in the blanks’ of its backstory since ENT, and I know many fans want good stewards who can take Trek past Voyager and beyond. Having Patrick Stewart on board as Picard to do this would just be incredible.

Yes so many of us want a show post Nemesis. I mean this is what I dream of personally but I never been into the idea of bringing back past crews. I just wanted to go forward again. But with the idea of Picard coming back I can’t tell you how excited I am about the possibility. To possibility go back to the 24th century with one of the franchise biggest characters this is, dare I say it, the best of both worlds! :)

I’d be surprised if we don’t see all of the principal cast involved in some wayand this could open up a whole host of spin off opportunities in the 24th Century with old and new characters.

Oh yeah if they get Stewart I’m certain more will follow. My only guess is it hinges on if they can get him first. If they can’t get something with him then it may not happen at all.

I’m just happy they are thinking about the 24th century again!

All I ever wanted was a post-Nem Trek show… but instead we have had nothing but prequel series and prequel movies. What’s worse is, reimaginings and visual reboots. But I look at the quality of Kurtzman’s work and I think… hang on… maybe he should leave that era of Trek alone. He doesn’t deserve to touch it.

Give me Captain Picard, give me Admiral Picard, give me Ambassador Picard! Hell I’ll take an animated Jean-Luc Picard, Captain of the USS Stargazer.

I think a USS Stargazer series will happen down the line but will be live action and a younger actor playing Picard. Animated shows will be ideal for bringing back classic characters and filling in gaps in the timeline that the actors are realistically too old to now play. You could maybe have a show between TMP and TWOK depicting Kirk’s second 5 year mission, or a post Star Trek Generations series.

Animated series works best for shows that want to use the TOS or TNG casts in some way. For me, the best and most intriguing time to explore is that 70 year gap between Generations and TNG.

I get that and mostly agree with you. The animated shows are ideal for them to give us more stories with TOS/TNG characters without the risk of bad casting choices. The Stargazer era would be one area where I’d be more willing to look at a recasting as Picard was already quite old at the start of TNG so I think audiences would be more accepting of a new actor given it takes place so early in his career. Of course recasting such an iconic character doesn’t come without risks so if they were to go down this route I think it could be wise to test the water by having flashback sequences in the Picard led show and cast somebody capable of leading a series if he was well received.

@Corinthian7 — I’m not sure how old you are, but I think there’s a whole new generation of potential Trek fans who have not seen TOS, nor TNG, and do not have the same biases those of us commenting on a Trek forum do. They don’t necessarily see them as iconic characters the way we do. The older fans may have a har dtime adjusting to this, but it’s unlikely the new ones will, and that’s who these shows are targeted toward.

I’m 44 @Curious-Cadet and I’m accepting of the fact that new shows have to appeal to a broader demographic but at the same time they’re relying on that built in fanbase to help make these projects a success. For my part that means respecting the source material whilst not being limited by the past and as such I’ve embraced DSC I don’t like everything about it but I can get past those things and still see a Star Trek show at it’s heart.

Regarding reaching out to a new generation of fans it’s true that this audience doesn’t know these characters as intimately as us but they are familiar with them. Particularly TOS, or at least Kirk, Spock and the Enterprise and that’s why even when trying to reach out to a new audience these reboots still focus on those characters and this period. The fact that both the Abrams series and the CBS relaunch of Trek still found a way to hold on to existing canon still shows that the long term fans are still important in terms of making these ventures successful.

Whether we get new shows focusing on brand new crews in new locations or nostalgic throwbacks I’m all in. Regarding recasting this is something that I am used to now so it’s not necessarily a problem. I do agree with ML31 that if you are doing adventures based on TNG/TOS that the animated route makes more sense given they’ve said that some of the new projects will be utilising this format but at the same time I wouldn’t be adverse to a live action Stargazer show. Likewise I’d be totally down with a Pike series and unless they pull off the unlikely and no doubt highly complex coup of signing up Quinto that’s going to mean another recasting of Spock.

Spectacular news if true!

I’ve been saying this for years. It’s an absolute no brainer…Now get Shatner involved in Tarantino’s film

Shatner will do anything if they pay him enough. I don’t mean this as a put down, just how he is.

I had Shatner mow my lawn once.

Hands down, this IS the greatest day of being a Trekkie. I’ve dreamed of something like this for decades. Now, it’s finally time to go there… It’s been a long road…

Here’s my wishlist:
1. I hope they’ll have Finn Wolfhard for the Academy series. Either as Spock or a new character.
2. Picard’s limited series should bring together characters from all three 24th century shows.
3. Get Javier Bardem for the Khan show! He should have been Khan in STID in the first place!

And yeah, I’d love to see Christoph Waltz as Jelico for the QT movie :-)

Tom Hiddleston as data.

I don’t know Finn Wolfhard but I’d be on board with 2 and 3.

I have no idea who Finn Wolfhard is lol. Looks like its time to Google.

Star of “Stranger Things”. He’s only 15. We don’t need another Wesley Crusher.

Oh thanks!

A good producer knows when he/she should seek help. I think Kurtzman needs to start making some calls. Ira Behr, Melissa Snodgrass, Ron Moore, DC Fontana. Reach out to these people!

Don’t forget Manny Coto on that list of yours. IMO he was just about to save ENT when this show got axed before he could make a difference.

IMHO, if Coto had been brought in for season 2 Enterprise would have had a full 7 seasons. When he did come in the show was already on the critical list and even though he breathed life into it, its death was certain by then.

What extactly was so great about season 4 of enterprise?
It was still filled with bad writing and stupid ideas like a holographic drone ship controlled by telepathy from light years away.
It was way better than 1 and 2 but not a patch on season 3 which the best because they actually did new stuff.

I think season 3 is excellent television, but the fans seem to generally prefer season 4 since it does feel more star trek-y. My main gripe with season 4 was trying to explain ridge less Klingons. Silly and unnecessary, we should be able to just accept that Roddenberry changed visual elements as he got bigger budgets and leave it at that.

” My main gripe with season 4 was trying to explain ridge less Klingons.”

The worst episode on Star Trek history in my book. Completely unnecessary fan-pandering that blew up canon.

Agreed. I’m glad the Discovery writers ignored that crap.

Yes, but now the next series will have to explain why the DSC Klingons look the way they do and speak with marbles.

And look like orcs who cannot express emotions.

You just said it yourself. It was better than seasons 1 & 2. And it did things I think most fans would have wanted from a prequel series. Let’s not judge it because of one bit of tech from one 3 episode arc. I didn’t think the two Klingon explanation episodes were even necessary and were probably (after These are the Voyages) the weakest two episodes of the season. I think season 3 was the turnaround season. Coto wasn’t the show runner but he came on board then. But by season 3 I think everyone knew the writing was on the wall.

Just no.

Other than the small subset of fans who still hold on to the inexplicable “Coto-the-savior” facade, most did not care for his fan-pandering, soap opera-like take on Star Trek — which is why the ratings slid both of his seasons, and even slid ep to ep within his seasons…fans were checking out, with no trend whatsoever upward that would indicate that fans were liking the new “Coto-Trek” take on Enterprise…FACT

Seasons 3 and 4 are perhaps more entertaining, but not for the right reasons. Seasons 1 and 2, boring and weak as they are, are actually better Star Trek.

“I think season 3 was the turnaround season.”

Completely wrong. The episode-to-episode ratings during Season 3 continued to drop significantly throughout the year, with more fans bailing out every week…fact! In a “turnaround season,” you would expect a ratings drop to at least level off…never happened…fact!

Season 3 was when the show got better. You don’t seem to be understanding that. It getting better means the show was turning around it’s lower quality skid. But, again, by that time the writing was indeed on the wall and the show was indeed dying. It was given a short reprieve, thanks to Coto and another fan campaign. But it was critical before he even arrived. Hence, it is reasonable to conclude that had he come on board sooner it is entirely possible the show would have lived longer. You hated of the show is clouding your judgement.

Nope, I provided real statistics that show that the fans continued to tune out during those supposedly improved seasons. You simply provide a “trust me it got better, and oh, you must be a hater” subjective conjecture — that’s all you got.

Ocaam’s Razor!

Your logic only works if you accept the concept of “quantity = quality”. Aren’t you the one who said that since STID made the most money of all the features that it therefore must be the best movie? The concept needed to support your theory is invalid. Therefore, your theory falls apart. Occam’s razor indeed.

I never said any such thing. There you go again putting words in my mouth that I never said.

Remember how you had that big emotional outburst here when you said I put words in your mouth?

I am perhaps getting people mixed up. I thought it could have been you because you were using the same flawed line of thinking that box office/ratings = quality. If it was not you then I was in error and I apologize.

That said, your logic still falls apart for the reason I already gave.

I’ll start off by stating that Enterprise Season Four aired on FRIDAY NIGHT. Very few shows have ever been able to break the “Friday night death slot.” That Friday night killed Enterprise like Friday nights have killed so many shows before it and after it.

I’d like to also point out that the correlation between viewership and show quality is tenuous at best. There’s some truth to it in some cases (some bad shows get bad ratings), but simply pointing to lower viewership as a sign that people were dissatisfied by the writing isn’t exactly accurate. Many really terrible shows get pretty good ratings and might last 7+ seasons.

I have seen only a handful of Star Trek fans in the last 15 years claim that they “did not care” for seasons 3 or 4,at least when compared to the first two seasons. In fact, virtually every single person who has watched Enterprise thoroughly enjoyed the final season (and sometimes season 3) far more than anything that came before it on the show.

As for the other comments about how “Vulcans changing because true teachings of Surak were found.” Maybe the reason was lost since the show aired, but a good portion of the vocal fandom was put off by the “different” behavior of the Vulcans in the first 3 seasons. The storyline they introduced was intended to rectify those discrepancies. Whether it succeed or not is probably up to the viewer, but there was a clear reasoning behind the episode. Those episodes definitely put into context some of the strange behavior the Vulcan High Command exhibited.

“I’ll start off by stating that Enterprise Season Four aired on FRIDAY NIGHT. Very few shows have ever been able to break the “Friday night death slot.” That Friday night killed Enterprise like Friday nights have killed so many shows before it and after it.

If the Friday night slot was bad, then of course one would expect to see an overall drop between seasons, and we did see that overall ratings drop between Seasons 3 and 4, so I will acknowledge that. However, and this is a big one, if now the Enterprise is on Friday nights for an entire season, while we would agree this slot would result in less viewership than the previous season based on the Friday night thing, this “excuse” cannot explain away why during the Friday nights run of Season 4, the ratings trend kept going down for each successive episode on the Friday night showings — this is completely opposite of what would be expected of an improving series…in an improving series, the ratings should at least stabilize for the night it is showing, not go down every freaking week. So this “excuse” simply does not hold water.

“I’d like to also point out that the correlation between viewership and show quality is tenuous at best. ”

Except in the case where by season 4, you only have hardcore Trek fans now still watching giving the dismal ratings decline over the past three years. Yet, even these hardcore fans were watching the show less and less every week as the season went forward…not even a slight stabilization of the downward ratings trend is shown, which any person would expect to see if the quality was vastly improved under the Coto regime. Thus there is not even the slightest inkling that the hardcore Trek fans still watching Enterprise at that point appreciated Season 4 more than the previous seasons.

I’d like to point out that while you commented on “I’d like to also point out that the correlation between viewership and show quality is tenuous at best”, you actually completely disregarded anything I said and continued to make the case that “viewership = quality.”

It would have been a lot easier to have just said, “I don’t agree with you.” Instead, we get Monday Morning Producing. You’re making some claims that can’t possibly be substantiated about viewership figures (e.g. who is a hardcore fan or not and if they were still watching).

I could also make the claim that can’t possibly be substantiated by claiming that Star Trek’s “hardcore” fan base is 2.53 million, the total of the lowest rated Neilsen rating during season 4. Wow, that was easy, and incredibly silly.

I’ll make it more straightforward for everyone: “Viewership is largely independent of show quality.”

Sorry, but you are the one who is talking specifically about “quality,” not me. I am talking about fans who continually decided to bail on Enterprise over time, and who continued to bail at roughly the same rate during the supposed “Many Coto-improvement years” of Enterprise. I am saying that they simply didn’t want to watch what they were being offered up as that series anymore. It’s up to all of us viewing these stats to determine our subjective opinion of why they kept turning out.

Apparently, you are suggesting it wasn’t because of quality, and you are entitled to that opinion.

I think it’s rather obvious that the fan’s who were still watching Enterprise in Seasons 3 and 4, with the huge ratings drop of the first two seasons behind them (in which one could easily conclude the general public and more casual fans had checked out), continued to show their lack of appreciation for what was being shown week-to-week by abandoning the show. The “consumers” were becoming less and less interested in Enterprise, as the ratings demonstrate.

I am stating here what I think is rather obvious to any objective person. You seem to want to change this to a different discussion about whether “viewership is largely independent of show quality.” I actually agree with you stating it in this fashion, because it is hard to correlate an empirical element (viewership) with a subjective element (quality).

However, I do think that “viewership is directly related to show popularity,” since both of these factors can be empirically measured, an conveniently, by the Nielsen Ratings. Furthermore, while you have the right pick holes all you want in my hypothesis that by the time the ratings of Enterprise got to the lowest levels in Star Trek history in Seasons 3 and 4, that only hardcore Enterprise fans were still watching; however, I find this to be a reasonable and rather, “like duh” hypothesis that simply makes a lot of common sense…would you have us believe that a lot of the general public was still sticking around and watching Enterprise in Season 4? Seriously???

I’m not sure what other conclusion I could possibly draw from your multiple posts about people abandoning the show. In fact, the posts that caused me to respond to you originally were because you took issue at a user saying “I think season 3 was the turnaround season”. It’s true it wasn’t a turnaround for ratings, however the user never implied it was, you did.

You took issue to that, tying that “turnaround” statement to viewership, and not “quality.” Talk to pretty much any Trekkie you’ll ever run across that watched the entire show, they’ll all say that “Season 3 was when the show got better.” While quality is completely subjective, it’s pretty disingenuous to gloss over what the user was implying, especially since you were making the bold assumption that “fans continued to tune out”, but now are conceding that “hardcore Enterprise fans were still watching” and it was the general public that ditched the show, which is something I wholeheartedly agree with.

“I’d like to also point out that the correlation between viewership and show quality is tenuous at best. ”

I was about to go there but you did it for me. Thanks. And yes, with a few exceptions Friday night is where networks traditionally put shows to die. It’s what NBC did with the 3rd season of TOS, too.

But it was not just the magic tech.
Most of the ties to tos made no sense from the observer effect to the one about Vulcans changing because true teachings of Surak were found.
Why would they be accepted plus since mind melds were considered so bad why would mind melds take off?

It’s not like those things happened the next day. The show was set 150 years before TOS, you know. Plenty of time for societal changes. Including humans.

It was not 150 but 110 before tos.
About half a life time for a Vulcan. Since mind melds were considered horrible things how did the message of surak get spread?

I had read 150 but even if it were only 100 that is still enough time for the new societal attitudes to take hold. It is not unreasonable at all.

It was literally a hundred years before TOS, stuff change. And it was clear they were going a direction to explain the Vulcan’s turnaround.

I guess it went viral! I do take your point though Isabella but when you think about it we didn’t really see that many Vulcan characters in TOS and the one that we focused on was a half human who aspired to be an idealised version of a Vulcan so that he could prove those wrong that had been prejudiced against him. Much of our assumptions on Vulcan society during this period were informed from viewing just one family and were fleshed out by the 24th Century shows which are a further 100 years after Enterprise. When viewed through the prism that is Enterprise episodes such as Amok Time and Journey to Babel make me question whether or not the societal change by the start of TOS was as great as we’ve always believed.

Yeah it was better than season 3 but it was fan servicing to the max and would not have sustained 7 seasons.

Isabella, EXACTLY. Please read by post above. There has been an attempted rewrite of history by a small group of fans on the internet the past couple of years who have come up with the ridiculous notion that Manny Coto was saving Enterprise. That is just not reality.

I always said if Enterprise continued and the other seasons turned out like season 4 then Enterprise could’ve been my favorite show….or at least second to DS9. ;)

And the ideas we heard about sounded pretty crazy: Romulan war, Section 31 back, Shran being a member on Enterprise, I was excited about the possibilities.

The ideas I heard were establishing Starbase One. Shran finding his way to Enterprise (which I found REALLY intriguing.) They were going to head toward the Romulan war and the formation of the Federation. It was all very exciting what Coto had in mind. It made me long for what did not come to pass. (The section 31 stuff I could do without)

I know you’re not totally onboard with today’s news and maybe I’m being overly optimistic here but you’ve got to admit that it could be great to see a limited Enterprise series set during the Romulan War with Coto as showrunner. It’s probably completely unrealistic to hope for this but these developments at least makes it remotely possible!

They couldn’t use Trip for it… Unless they wanted to say that his death was merely a holodeck fantasy. And if done well I would be completely on board with a Romulan War set show.

Trip would be fine for an Enterprise reboot as there’s a big time jump between Terra Prime and These Are The Voyages with the Romulan War occurring during this period period. Of course I wouldn’t object to them retconning Tucker’s death. Like you say it’s easy to do, just have a throwaway conversation about historical holonovel’s only loosely being based on real events and somebody could use the Trip death as a prime example.

ENT S4’s multi part story arc, filling in the gaps of TOS, seems like a forerunner to Discovery’s storytelling style to me, and it does sound as if S5 would have been more so.

The whole Coto thing supposedly turning Enterprise around is a complete wet dream from the handful of fans who liked Enterprise and are trying to rewrite it’s sad failure. Here is the truth:

– The Ratings of Season 3, with Coto starting to get involved, dropped significantly from season 2.

– For those who will say it wasn’t Coto’s fault that Season 2 viewers dropped out, guess what == The ratings for Season 4, with Coto at the helm now, dropped significantly from Season 3 — this is the opposite trend one would expect if a series was truly improving…fans continued to bail out and thus were obviously not swayed by Coto’s new focus.

– During the runs of Seasons 3 and 4, the ratings trend kept going down for each successive episode within these seasons — this is completely opposite of what would be expected of an improving series…in an improving series, the ratings should at least stabilize through a mid-season, not go down every week.

Many Coto didn’t rescue Enterprise; he buried it for good. Other than a small subset of fans, most did not care for his fan-pandering, soap opera-like take on Star Trek. The numbers tell the story. Like, duh!

Coto turned Enterprise in to a TOS fan service show.

Plus he had a odd obsession with Romulans.
As you say improving tv shows do better not worse.

Shows get better all the time and ratings can still fall. Fans were just tired of Trek by then but the reviews for the show did get better. I guess you don’t know this but DS9’s rating fell every season it was on, including when the Dominion war started and what turned many fans around. They were still very strong ratings of course but the show had less viewers in its final season than its first season. Look it up. So no this isn’t a shock what happened to Enterprise. To this day the ONLY Trek show who had much stronger ratings in its last season compared to the first was TNG.

And from what I heard Enterprise got moved around in its final season and was placed on a Friday (I was living outside of America at the time so I don’t know) which is the death kill. Same thing happened to TOS in its final year.

For the record I stopped watching Enterprise after season 1. I heard it got better in seasons 3 and 4, I still didn’t bother to watch it. I didn’t watch it again until 2013 after STID premiered and I was just looking for some more Star Trek and here was a show that had about 60 episodes I never saw before. I watched the series in its entirety and by the time I was done I regretted I gave up on it. This is the reason why I won’t give up on Discovery so soon. Trek shows usually just get better. Everyone knows this even if its still not for them.

Oh, I have been analyzing the ratings of the Trek series for years. First of all, DS9 was overlapped first by TNG, and secondly, by Voyager, so the Trek fan audience was somewhat split by two Trek series being on at once, whereas Enteprise did not have any other Trek shows to divide fans with. Secondly, the average Neilsen Rating for DS9 through it’s run, even when considering it had Trek series competition, was about double that of Enterprise’s. DOUBLE!

All these excuses about Enterprise sill don’t explain how if the show was so bad at first, then supposedly was significantly improved later, why the ratings not only did not show some stabilization, but continued dropping year after year, and withing the eps of each season as well. Fans kept tuning out regardless…because obviously the product was not worth them tuning in.

That’s all fair. But I still hold it comes down to people losing interest in general.

The exact same thing happened with Beyond. People said that movie was better than STID and yet it still made less than that film week to week meaning even if the word of mouth was BETTER it still got less people to watch it every week compared to what STID did. Now I’m not directly comparing the two I’m simply saying a lot of people simply never returned regardless if it was good or bad. I think putting it on a Friday definitely made it worse.

Look, I get your point, maybe Enterprise didn’t get everyone as excited in fourth season as people are letting on. And I will say its still probably the worst of the shows for a lot of fans even if they did like it more at the end. But, again, look at online polling. The show clearly is seen as more popular now.

On IMDB its rating stands at a 7.5/10 which is still the lowest out of all the older shows but its still higher than Discovery’s at 7.4/10. TNG has the highest of them all with 8.6.

On Metacritic the show has a user score of 7.1. Still lower than the older shows but much higher than Discovery which is at 4.7 userscore. That’s abysmal.

On Rottentomatoes the user score is around 65% which is decent but not amazing but it still beats Discovery userscore of 56%.

I guess what I’m saying is maybe Enterprise still doesn’t wow everyone but it doesn’t seem to be hated like it use to base on those scores. I think a lot of people, like me, has went back to it over the years since its everywhere lol and has come around. Oddly enough its now Discovery that is on the lowest end of the totem pole in fan popularity but you WOULD think it would still be Entperprise if it was hated as people claim they did, right?

And this isn’t a slight against Discovery. Its early and I know its pretty divisive for the fanbase at the moment. But in a season or two it could be more popular than all the others. My only point is that the fanbase does come around with most shows in time. Discovery is the latest ‘this really sucks’ show. If that wasn’t the case TNG and DS9 probably would’ve been cancelled by third season. Sadly for Enterprise it was on a failing network that changed hands that helped doomed it faster.

I get your points, and you make some good ones. However, you are using “fan voting” internet popularity polls to base conclusions on. Those polls are notorious for being populated by fanboy types with “group-think” voting, and they are not considered as statistically valid measures of public opinion.

By contrast, the Nielsen Ratings for Enterprise represent a statistically valid survey sample, with all the math and error rates that come with a scientific poll. You can rely on those rating numbers as being “representative” of an actual cross-section of TV viewers, versus internet popularity polls, which are likely way off what an actual cross-section of real viewers would rate on.

Big difference!

But what’s interesting, is that RT does attempt to get more closer to a somewhat scientific poll by taking a poll of published movie/TV reviewers to establish the Tomatometer. So I trust this poll more than I do the user ratings, because only established reviewers are voting, and they get one vote each. So guess what the ratings are for DSC and Enterprise using this more believable ratings tool:

DSC: 82%
Enterprise: 50%

A complete mismatch to the “unscientific internet fanboy popularity contest” user ratings. And I will tell you why I think this is a case. For new shows like DSC, people who dislike the show are all over the place, talking to each other on the internet, creating and uproar…and these people tend to readily vote on this popularity polls. Whereas, the casual fan who likes DSC, and who is part of huge numbers of the same, is rather more lazy about taking the trouble to vote on these sites in favor of a new show. Contrast this to an older show like Enterprise, which is largely forgotten and for which these popular vote systems were not predominant back then, well now, the small group of fans who love that show just vote a lot for it, and those of us (myself included) don’t really take the time to vote in a low rating…hence the ratings are artificially inflated.

…To illustrate this issue further, there are only “50” user votes for Enterprise Season 4 versus nearly 7000 user votes for DSC Season 1 — I just looked this up, and I am surprised by how much this confirms what I just said. I could call up 25 friends who I know were dissappointed in Enterprise like I was, and twist their arm to vote, and we could completely change this rating on RT tomorrow. That’s why I really don’t trust or believe in these movie site popularity polls — they mean nothing!

But again Discovery is the least popular show in EVERY online rating out there. It would be different if there was one poll where it was number two, another number four, another number three and so on. Its the consistency of the ratings that says a lot.

And are you really surprised??? I’m on Reddit, people really seem to hate the show more then they like it. Go to Youtube and look at the comments section of the Discovery trailers, its 99% negative. I’m serious.

Now of course I get what you’re saying, that may not be the OVERALL view of the show, I don’t disagree. I’m only making the point the show is far from loved lol. But I also think enough people like here are watching it and giving it a chance LIKE they did when TNG premiered and DS9.

I honestly doubt more than a few million people are even watching it on AA. BUT its probably easily the most popular new show there by a mile. I don’t hear anything about the other shows and clearly Discovery is bringing enough attention to AA they feel more Trek shows will do the same.

So overall its positive, but no I don’t think its a very loved show with the fans overall, not yet at least.

And people keep saying how much the show is ‘popular’ and ‘loved’ here. Well um, based on what????? All we have is the internet with polls and obviously boards like this. So if people are going to make that claim A. show actual proof and B. Where ELSE are they going to get if not on online polls?

OK I get it, you want to contest how the data is collected, that’s fine. But then where is the proof Discovery is actually well liked among the fanbase? And if you say none of this proves Discovery isn’t that popular then you can argue Enterprise is actually MORE popular as well. I just don’t think you can have it both ways and say this proves that Enterprise is not popular but then argue that Discovery is actually more popular.

So this is at least SOME indication how the fanbase feels and let’s be honest its more on the negative side than the positive, but it doesn’t mean its ‘hated’, just not as well liked as the others. At least not yet. In a year that can change.

In the unscientific popularity poll on Enterprise had only 50 votes on RT…50 votes! And DSC had about 7000 votes.

So if I am to your accept (and I don’t, sorry) your request that I accept that DSC is a thought of by fans as a better show than Enterprise because it’s RT user rating was 65 versus DSC’s being 56, then you would have to allow me to make the point that tons more people are watching DSC versus having ever watched Enterprise…140 TIMES AS MANY people if we are to believe those RT numbers (which I don’t).

But you’re ignoring the OTHER polls man. ON IMDB Enterprise has 36,000 votes and Discovery has 50,000 votes. It still ranks lower but not much lower.

The only real point being made is that Discovery is NOT highly ranked online in and of itself. Forget Enterprise for a minute which most people here seems to agree that show is not highly ranked and the polls bare that out. But oddly enough people seem to think that Discovery is a really popular and loved show, again WHERE is anyone getting this???

Look, my original point was really showing that ENT has gained popularity over the years but its clear it hasn’t gone that far up, but certainly more in the likable stage now. I only pointed out DIS because to prove ALL Star Trek shows have a hard time in the early years. This is just a fact. DIS seems to have just as much trouble being accepted by fans as they all have.

Every Trek show seems to be met with scorn or at least suspicion but in time they all seem to win over most of the fanbase. I think Enterprise easily had the hardest time with that, but mostly because it was cancelled sooner than the others.

DIS seems like its going through the exact same rocky steps as the others. Nothing anywhere indicates Discovery is a home run with the overall fanbase. It seems to be the complete opposite.

When a show is a break out hit its first season its not hard to find indicators of that online. Stranger Things, Westworld, House of Cards, Orphan Black, Orange if the New Black, you name it you can go to every online poll and every message board and its clear where fandom was at when a lot of these shows started.

Discovery is nothing close to that anywhere. But neither were most Trek shows in their beginning years.

“But oddly enough people seem to think that Discovery is a really popular and loved show, again WHERE is anyone getting this???”

I had a discussion with Borg/Klingon about that a short while ago. He claimed that he has personally interacted with thousands of fans at conventions and other such events. A total he feels is a large enough sample size to draw a good conclusion from and according to him, not one of them think STD is less than mediocre. He is also of the opinion that high ratings = high quality. Using his logic, “The Big Bang Theory” is the pinnacle of quality TV today.

Thats funny because on the OTHER website a similar thing happened. I was reading on it a few months back where someone tried to claim that 90% of the fan base loves Discovery. Naturally others pushed back on that and asked where did they get that number and they admitted it was just a guess through talking to people at a convention about the show lol.

I mean c’mon, you have to be fair about this. If you want to question polls online and their accuracy that’s 100% valid but then you can’t use anecdotal evidence as ‘proof’ because you talked to people at a convention or your neighbors and concluded people really love the show. ESPECIALLY when there is no proof of what you say is even true. In those cases we literally just have to take their word for it.

But its just another example that people want to feel like their opinion is part of the majority. If you like something you have to believe everyone else feels that way. You hate it, the same thing. I guess it validates people’s opinion more if more agree with them which I understand of course. But you still have to back it up in a meaningful way.

“Thats funny because…”

It would have been funny if I had actually said that.

Tiger, you have been duped by this person into siding with his attempt to make up for discussions he and I have had which did not go the way he was hoping. I apologize that he dragged you into this.

No, BorgKlingon. I’m pretty sure it was you who claimed that you spoke to enough people to get a good enough sample size to decide that your opinion was the overwhelming majority. Which is, in a word, preposterous.

I never said “thousands of people” and you know it. THAT IS A HUGE, GROSS EXAGGERATION OF WHAT I SAID — an order of magnitude greater that what I said.

Waiting for your apology???

No. But in order to get a large enough sample for your conclusion that is the minimum number it HAD to be. So either you actually did speak to literally thousands (which I think based on your reactions we can both agree is preposterous), or your conclusions aren’t viable. Which is it?

I never said “thousands of people” and you know it. THAT IS A HUGE, GROSS EXAGGERATION OF WHAT I SAID — an order of magnitude greater that what I said.

Waiting for your apology??

Getting tired of repeating this but here goes again…

Do you deny that you claimed you personally spoke to enough people to draw a reasonable conclusion about who well STD has been received?

I never said “thousands of people” and you know it. THAT IS A HUGE, GROSS EXAGGERATION OF WHAT I SAID — an order of magnitude greater that what I said.

Waiting for your apology?

We are done here.

You are grossly exaggerating what I said, and you know it.

The next time you whine like a baby to me with “don’t put words in my mouth,” don’t expect me to acknowledge it.

Again, you have different rules for you own behavior versus others…you continually give yourself a free pass right as you critique others.

Do you deny that you claimed you personally spoke to enough people to draw a reasonable conclusion about who well STD has been received?

Again, I never said “thousands of people” and you know it. THAT IS A HUGE, GROSS EXAGGERATION OF WHAT I SAID — an order of magnitude greater that what I said.

Waiting for your apology???

That is not a denial. Therefore I will conclude that you believe that you have spoken to enough viewers of STD to determine that it is indeed very well received. Even though there is plenty of evidence to counter that and it is so unlikely you have spoken to anywhere close the total to draw a statistical trend of any kind that it is safe to conclude your claim is either in error or an outright lie.

I never said “thousands of people” and you know it. THAT IS A HUGE, GROSS EXAGGERATION OF WHAT I SAID — an order of magnitude greater that what I said.

Waiting for your apology? Admit you lied here and put words in my mouth that I never said??

Critic ratings are always different from userratings on TV shows because usually critic ratings are based on the premiere or the first few episodes. True userratings are based on whatever fans watched last but the fact is people still vote and why I think fan ratings are more accurate.

That and the fact this is a trend on ALL the polls. Every single one, they are all rated in the same order: TNG, TOS, DS9, VOY, ENT and DIS. That’s the basic trend.

The funny thing is you’re NOT wrong about Enterprise, it really does seem to rate the lowest out of all the older shows, it just rates higher than Discovery which is not surprising given how divisive it is.

But nearly every show that was the newest was usually the most unpopular, at least for awhile. TNG, no argument lol. DS9 was least popular then TOS and TNG. Voyager I will argue was probably MORE popular than DS9 when it started but still less than TNG and TOS. And then Enterprise which was the least when it premiered. And now its Discovery.

So again, this is just pretty common. Maybe in time Discovery will win over the fan base more. But I’m not shocked its the least popular among the fanbase because it is VERY divisive and many are not happy with the continuity issues. I don’t think most fans, but certainly enough put it hat way. For everyone who says they love it another says they loathe it.

“That and the fact this is a trend on ALL the polls. Every single one, they are all rated in the same order: TNG, TOS, DS9, VOY, ENT and DIS. That’s the basic trend.”

No, to call something “a trend” is based on a scientifically conducted poll with a valid statistical sample. None of those polls have a representative sample — they are all popularity contests by whoever has the time to show up and vote, and the reason TNG always wins over TOS is only because their are more people in their mid 30’s to 50’s today spending tons of time on the internet today versus the older generations. I mean, come on, TNG doesn’t rise up to the TOS…no one in the general public would even watch TNG movies. TNG has a decent following of fans, but it’s not iconic like TOS. Give me a break!

I even saw a poll on a fan site recently that had a result that TNG had a better first season TOS??? WTF??? Because those TNG always show up to artificially vote up these meaningless, unscientific popularity polls, as those folks spend a ton of time on the internet.

Oh man, I’d love for Gallup or some university to conduct a real scientific poll of these series…that would expose all of these user rating sites as the frauds that they are.

Again, you seem to discount the simple fact that there is no place that shows DIS IS more popular. All those places I pointed out aren’t ‘fan sites’ they are general movie and TV review and information. They are for general audiences, not for fanboys.

And now you’re showing your bias. You don’t think TNG can’t be more popular than TOS? Based on what? TNG lasted for 7 seasons and basically created an entire spin off of shows due to its popularity. I’m sure many people love TOS including me but I don’t think its a shock that TNG could be more popular in this day and age, especially if it has a younger fan base. Again maybe it is or isn’t but its not exactly a surprise if it is. Go on Reddit, TNG is clearly the most popular show there and Reddit is the biggest online Trek community I know of. There is also a reason why there is so much excitement about having Picard in another show vs the others announced.

As far as DIS you act like its a conspiracy lol. Is it REALLY that hard to believe this show is not as popular as you think it is? I’m going to ask one.more.time but based on WHAT then?

You keep discounting the polls shown, but you haven’t proven they are not true either, which is why I’m not sure why anyone would be surprised?

” You don’t think TNG can’t be more popular than TOS? Based on what?”

TOS is my personal favorite and I rate it as light years better than TNG. But I understand that more people like TNG to TOS. Unlike others, I do not claim my opinions reflect the majority opinion of the general population.

Yes this is what bothers me about the internet, that people feel their opinion is the consensus. It obviously happens a lot. I pointed out in this thread I liked TLJ while acknowledging its bad plotting and character issues but I understand most fans didn’t like it. That doesn’t sway my thoughts on the film personally and I’m not upset more people didn’t like it. There are plenty of valid reasons not to.

As far as DIS I wasn’t tying to get into a fight about it but I’m on plenty of other Trek boards besides this one and its the exact same discussions about it everywhere. There does seem to be a deep divide over the show anywhere you go and while I will certainly agree its usually the vocal minority who shout louder about not liking something its pretty obvious Discovery doesn’t seem to be loved by the overwhelming majority either. Nowhere does that seem to be the case. Does that mean more people hate it than like it, of course not. I really do think more people who are watching it like it, but it does seem like for majority falls in the ‘OK’ range than love it range. Again it just based on all the boards I been reading since the show started.

It doesn’t mean I’m right of course but does seem to fall in line with the polls out there about the show which is generally average and the least liked so far overall when compared to the other shows. That’s why I’m not shocked by them.

“Yes this is what bothers me about the internet, that people feel their opinion is the consensus.”

I agree completely. That is the problem I pointed out with those internet popularity polls that are driven by “crowd effects” and are not to be trusted.

“Yes this is what bothers me about the internet, that people feel their opinion is the consensus.”
I agree 100% Tiger.. and I have to note with irony how your comment is being repurposed already!

“I agree 100% Tiger.. and I have to note with irony how your comment is being re-purposed already!”

Kind of hard for it to be re purposed by me, since I pretty much started the conversation by saying the same thing to Tiger above:

“..you are using “fan voting” internet popularity polls to base conclusions on. Those polls are notorious for being populated by fanboy types with “group-think” voting, and they are not considered as statistically valid measures of public opinion.”

The only re-purposing going on here is you interjecting this post in a lame attempt to make up for that recent discussion which did not go that well for you given your emotional responses. Your re-purposing here is neither ironic, nor is it surprising, I am sorry to have to say.

BorgKlingon I have asked over and over again what proof do you have that REFUTES these polls then?

You want to discount them but then you have no evidence to prove why they are wrong. You obviously see the problem lol.

Look, this isn’t rocket science, if a show is REALLY popular with fans you would have no problem finding that on the internet. You call it ‘fan voting’ well then where are all the fans who are over voting who love the show? It goes both ways, right? How hard is it to find plenty of places where the show is completely adored?

You cited the idea that more people who are TNG fans vote online and why its more popular. Uh, OK, but your argument is flawed because even if more people vote for TNG as a great show because its ‘younger’ more savvy people are TNG fans, you seem to miss the fact people STILL voted for TOS not only overwhelmingly but also as a great show too, correct? Its not like TOS is down in the gutter somewhere, the show is still overwhelmingly positive with majority of fans meaning plenty of people voted for it, simply less so than TNG. But if you want to argue there are more TNG fans vs TOS fans, fine, that’s not my main point.

But do you see inherit the problem? How come NONE of these people are voting for Discovery as highly as the other shows? Why is there not ONE ‘fan poll’ where Discovery has any higher ratings than any of these shows? Thats why this argument makes no sense to me. If there were just as many people out there who loves TNG and TOS vote in these things, how come you can’t find just as many to vote for Discovery? Scientific or not? If enough people voted it as high as they do the other shows then the results would still be higher, right, regardless if 50 or 50,000 voted.

On the opposite end of that if you ask me to find you polls of shows that ARE considered highly popular and well liked I can find you those in under five minutes.

The reality is if a show is really popular among its fan base its not a problem to find it. ESPECIALLY with new shows that are in the headlines everywhere.

So what evidence do you have Discovery is actually a more popular show than Enterprise? Or any of them? There doesn’t seem to be much of anywhere for a reason.

Tiger2, do you really have confidence in voluntary, internet popularity fan polls in comparing old TV shows with less than 100 votes to current shows that have nearly 10,000 votes?

Have you ever take Statistics in college? Do you understand what terms like, “population defintion,” “sample size,” “representative sample,” “error margin,” “standard distribution,” and other terms mean?

Assuming your answer is no, I would submit that you are inordinately influenced by these rather meaningless polls that are not statistically relevant, and do not provide anything close to an accurate representation of what a real cross section of the general public, Star Trek fans (casual and hardcore), across all age groups, and across the world, really rate any of these shows.

And so, because you insist we try to make sense of these polls, we are left to postulate why these nonsensical polls have the numbers that they have. I simply postulate, using good ole common sense, that he very limited number of people (only 50 votes for example for Ent Season 4 on RT) who will vote on a nearly 20-year old TV series are likely to be big fans of the TV series. And I also postulate that for a current series, in a poll which is voluntary, you are going an inordinate amount of people who have negative feelings on a showing voting it down. Can I prove this, of course not — so please stop posting like I am claiming this is fact — this is my common sense explanation on how one might try to make any comparison between a current series which has 7000 freaking votes versus an 18 year old series which has 50 votes.

I would add, that it should bother you that anyone could get 5 friends together, and each establish 5 separate RT user accounts, and all vote 25 times (total) as RT users and rate Enterprise Season 4 at the lowest rating, and move the dial of support down for that show by 33%. I guess though that you believe that those 50 votes represent an accurate, statistically valid representation of fan opinion on Ent Season 4 — God Bless and you and White House as well, because that’s the kind of math they use these days.

@BorgKlingon You’re COOL.

Its pretty simple, if you watch a show, you go online a poll has a choice between 1-10 rating the show, you choose a number and get an average raging. It doesn’t matter if its 10 people or 10,000 the point being people rate what they think. Enough rate higher, it gets higher. Enough rates lower, it gets lower.

And again you KEEP only mentioning RT lol. I cited THREE polls man, they all trend the same which btw seems to trend how most people view most of the shows in terms of popularity: TNG, TOS, DS9, VOY, ENT and now DIS. That seems to be the usual consensus of how the shows is rated through the fanbase. Obviously not everyone has them in this order (DS9 is first on my list) but that looks fair in terms of people overall ranking of the shows. And the fact they land this way for every poll also says a lot.

Fine forgot RT, look at IMDB:

79,000 votes for TNG: 8.6
62,000 votes for TOS: 8.3
41,000 votes for DS9: 7.9
46,000 votes for VOY: 7.7
36,000 votes for ENT: 7.5
50,000 votes for DIS: 7.4

“I simply postulate, using good ole common sense, that he very limited number of people (only 50 votes for example for Ent Season 4 on RT) who will vote on a nearly 20-year old TV series are likely to be big fans of the TV series.”

So you DO admit Enterprise has fans? Good to know! That’s what I been saying, that the fanbase HAS increased over the years since the show has gone off the air. And not just 50 people lol. Clearly not in a huge wave but on a level to the other shows even is still less of them. DIS however is NEW and usually every new Trek show gets more hate and division, HENCE why I am not surprised of those ratings. So why are you? That’s what I believe. Later in a few seasons it may change…as every Trek show has done. You get my point?

“And I also postulate that for a current series, in a poll which is voluntary, you are going an inordinate amount of people who have negative feelings on a showing voting it down. Can I prove this, of course not.”

Well then tell that to the fans of these new shows that are in 1st or 2nd seasons:

7,100 votes for Killing Eve: 8.5
280,000 votes for Westworld: 8.9
30,000 votes for Atlanta: 8.6
73,000 votes for Handmaid’s Tail: 8.9

Yeah its crazy how shows that people think are actually good and have a strong fanbase still manages to get high ratings for brand new shows. And REGARDLESS how many people actually watch or vote for the show. Do you think those shows are conspired against as well?

And what’s funny about this is, again which you K-E-E-P ignoring is that people claim Discovery is a popular and well liked show? Sixth time dude, based on what? I know those shows I quoted above are popular and well liked because you can go anywhere on the internet and see how popular they are. I can’t seem to find that for Discovery, which is why I’m not shocked it has a lower rating.

If you’re going to try and discount actual fans voting and expressing their opinion then where is everyone getting the idea DIS is well liked in the fanbase?

Sorry, but you just don’t get the issue with online polls.

From Slate:

“Surprising though it may seem, the results of a scientific poll of a few hundred randomly sampled people can be extrapolated to the larger population (to a 95 percent degree of confidence and within a margin of error). But the results of an online “poll” in which thousands or even millions of users participate cannot be extrapolated to anything, because those results tell you only about the opinions of those who participated. Online polls are actually elections, of a kind. Online polls are a direct descendent of newspaper and magazine straw polls, which were popular in the 19th and early 20th centuries. The print-media straw polls (very different from today’s political straw polls but equally inaccurate) featured clip-out coupons that readers sent in to cast ballots for their preferred candidate. Other organizers of straw polls mailed ballots to people on a list of names. The most infamous of these took place in 1936 when Literary Digest sent 10 million presidential ballots to people, based on telephone directories and automobile registration lists. More than 2 million of the ballots were returned, and based on the results, the magazine predicted Republican Alf Landon would carry 57 percent of the popular vote and defeat Franklin Delano Roosevelt in a landslide. Literary Digest was wrong, of course, and straw polls never recovered, at least as a predictive tool.”

CONCLUSION: The results of online polls are essentially meaningless, as I have been saying all along here; that are not representative.

From Pew Research:

“The accuracy of a poll depends on how it was conducted. Most of Pew Research’s polling is done by telephone. By contrast, most online polls that use participants who volunteer to take part do not have a proven record of accuracy. There are at least two reasons for this. One is that not everyone in the U.S. uses the internet, and those who do not are demographically different from the rest of the public. Another reason is that people who volunteer for polls may be different from other people in ways that could make the poll unrepresentative. At worst, online polls can be seriously biased if people who hold a particular point of view are more motivated to participate than those with a different point of view. A good example of this was seen in 1998 when AOL posted an online poll asking if President Clinton should resign because of his relationship with a White House intern. The online poll found that 52% of the more than 100,000 respondents said he should. Telephone polls conducted at the same time with much smaller but representative samples of the public found far fewer saying the president should resign (21% in a CBS poll, 23% in a Gallup poll, and 36% in an ABC poll). The president’s critics were highly motivated to register their disapproval of his behavior, and this resulted in a biased measurement of public opinion in the AOL online poll.”

CONCLUSION — You really can’t trust any of those online rating numbers — they can be way, way off.

From AV News:

Young men are the people most likely to be regular voters at the IMDB movie information site, and it’s only the opinions of IMDB regulars that shape the Top 250. Casual users of the site don’t have a say in the matter. Bros were the ones who decided that The Shawshank Redemption was the best film ever made, while electing all but two of Nolan’s guy-friendly films to the Top 250. Meanwhile, no films directed by women even make the list, and not a single film in the top 20 has a female protagonist. Part of the problem, the article asserts, is that the guys who normally vote on the IMDB are selecting movies based on what image of themselves they’d like to project to the world. As film critic Amy Nicholson puts it, nominating Shawshank “makes you sound tough but sensitive and smart.” Meanwhile, the upper reaches of the Top 250 are dominated by characters and franchises beloved by young men, like Star Wars and Lord Of The Rings. The IMDB’s rankings are intended to give power to the people rather than to the industry elite, but it seems that one group of people may be wielding entirely too much influence within the current system.

CONCLUSION — Internet fan”boy” group-think dominates these online polls. And their has been tons of blow-back from are large segment of this group against the diversity and women in DSC, hence the vote a lot of low ratings for DSC.

And YET you keep ignoring the fact people are saying DIS is a popular show by fans lol. Based on WHAT then???? You can’t have it both ways and say fans really love the show but then have literally zero proof to back it up. At least that’s what I’m trying to do.

But OK we’ll agree to disagree and move on. Its all been said at this point.

Thanks Borg Klingon, for putting me straight. I thought it was you repuprosing.. when in fact it was ME repurposing all the time.. Let me guess the next groove in your record (after you’ve accused me of some other slight): you’d like an apology. Odd how you never get one wouldn’t you say..?

No worries. Thanks!

You won’t get a response from me on this specific thread until I receive an apology for your gross exaggeration of what I said regarding my interaction with fans at conventions.

“Go on Reddit, TNG is clearly the most popular show there and Reddit is the biggest online Trek community I know of. ”

Exactly — you broke the code! Reddit is an internet site largely represented Trek fans in their mid 30’s to 50’s today spending tons of time on the internet today versus the older generations. A perfect example of what I was getting at!

BorgKlingon the problem with your argument boils down to you want to just ignore any data that goes against your argument lol. I mean, seriously, not a super strong case there. Again the problem is you want to discount everything online but somehow you have proof what you’re saying is right?

And look, no offense, but I have asked you four times now to at least show me what makes you think Discovery is a more popular show…and you have ignored it, correct? So how am I suppose to believe what you’re telling me if you can’t even show me anything that goes to your point? At least I attempted to do that with mine.

And if you can’t provide anything, then yeah not sure why I should think other wise. Again nothing I said has been remotely proven wrong.

Tiger2, since nobody has actual viewership data or “ratings” on DSC, of course I can’t provide quantitative measurements like we had with the Nielsen Ratings for the four seasons of Enterprise. I never claimed that I could provide such ratings for DSC, so I don’t quite get your “lol’s,” “no offense’s”, etc here — like you think you have caught me I guess in a “gotcha” moment? Sorry, but I NEVER said I had actual numbers on DSC.

However, what any objective person would see here with DSC given the recent press, is a show that CBS has not only renewed, but is obviously gung-ho big time on — so much so that they are already talking about multiple spin-offs by the DSC Exec Producer, etc.

Contrast this with the malaise and near-panic that was evident after the completion of each of the first three seasons of Enterprise. You not only had continually declining TV ratings, but you had a network that was publicly disappointed with the series, and the majority of fans who were very disappointed with the series AT THAT TIME. Perhaps you are younger than I and have “consumed” Enterprise more recently, and don’t realize what the situation was as that time?

Are you truly prepared to “tell me with a straight face” that “the vibe” around Enterprise after Season 1 is better than “the vibe” about the future of DSC after Season 1? Seriously ???

I’m not talking about how many actually watch the show. I’m talking about the ones who do watch it and their thoughts ON the show. I mean I thought this was clear lol.

My ENTIRE argument was TV ratings don’t necessarily match the quality of a show just like box office don’t match the quality of a movie. C’mon we ALL know this by now.

But OK, I GET your point and I ACKNOWLEDGE your point long ago and that is while Enterprise was perceived as better in its last season its TV ratings still dropped. I even SAID while I think people just stop caring in general it was also a sign that the season was still not strong enough to keep them interested. So we don’t really disagree that much there.

And look maybe I should’ve pointed this out before but I didn’t think I needed to but I think Discovery first season was MUCH BETTER than Enterprise first season, no question. OK? That’s not an argument for me at all even though Discovery still had tons of issues I think overall it was more successful then Enterprises. So again, we agree on this hands down.

But all I’m saying and what I’m trying to make the point is Enterprise has risen considerably in its popularity SINCE its been off the air. And yes I think when you compare Enterprise OVERALL to Discovery there are probably more people who like Enterprise vs Discovery. I certainly place myself in that category.

HOWEVER, as I also made very clear A. I’m comparing the show first season to the overall seasons of the other shows and B. Because it is new and very divisive. But as I also made clear they ALL were including Enterprise obviously. I would say out of all the spin offs Voyager was the least decisive from the beginning BUT that didn’t mean it was more popular because the show wasn’t as good in the long run.

But no I’m convinced Discovery is very popular and I will go as far as to say the same issues people had with Enterprise they are having with this show. Everything seems to bare that out. Where is this big Discovery fan base? I don’t see it anywhere, do you? But again I’m not convinced more than 3-4 million people are watching it, at least in America. My guess is if it was more than that CBS would be crowing about it.

And suggesting Discovery is popular because its been renewed? They all been renewed lol. EVEN shows that struggled like TOS and Enterprise so that doesn’t mean anything. I said a year ago Discovery is going to get three seasons NO MATTER WHAT due to the situation its in. It was no way this show was E-V-E-R going to get cancelled first season. That was never going to happen, especially with the deal with Netflix. Now I’m not saying its not popular, it could be, but we really don’t know and a renewal means very little at this stage.

And as far other Trek shows, while I think its proof Discovery is pulling viewers, its not proof that the show is a big hit on its own. And what I mean by that is DIS EASILY getting the most subs on that site, I don’t think its getting as many as CBS hoped meaning its not enough to keep people invested in the site all year. And I don’t think it was meant to be but many people predicted they would have to put on more Trek shows to keep the audience they have longer than 3-4 months on it. It just came sooner than later. But yes you can definitely read it either way.

So again I agree with you I think Discovery has a better first season than Enterprise first season. Where I disagree is that the show is more popular. It seems to be on par or lower than that show overall. And certainly much less popular than the others so far.

Hmm, now in reading this post, I actually don’t think we are as far apart as both of us may have perceived us to be earlier. Thanks for explaining yourself better — now I will attempt to do the same.

In “MY OPINION”, DSC has made much more vocal — and prone to “Group-think” — people who dislike the show, with a large percentage not liking the show because of diversity and/or perceptions that it does not fit well with their politics…and these type of people are much more likely to take the time to vote (possible multiple times under different aliases) on these voluntary, unscientific, online polls versus the average fan who “likes the show with reservations” (which anecdotally, from my network of many fans I know, I believe to the “silent majority” opinion on DSC)…thus I suspect pushing the numbers in a lower direction than one would expect given the CBS seems not only very happy with whatever viewership they have, but they are already expanding the franchise (and I am not even including the very good reviews of the show across the professional reviewing community. This is my BELIEF…I cannot prove it, but I highly suspect that this is a MAJOR FACTOR.

Regarding Enterprise, you are correct in that the show is more popular and is perceived as of better quality now versus in the early 2000’s — good point! My point though is that since we are comparing DSC right now as the first season has just ended, I think a better comparison to Enterprise is to look at fan reception and failing ratings “back in the day,” not today, in which I acknowledge that some are reconsidering Enterprise, obviously.

Of note, you are tempting me to go back and try Enterprise again. I have not watched it since it aired, and it really irritated me back then. I have the Blu-ray set because I found it in a Best Buy bin for $29 a couple years back (I will buy anything Star Trek if it’s on sale…LOL), so maybe it’s time I give it another shot…but I will skip the fantasy massage/decontamination softcore scenes and the dumbass Klingon appearance changes eps — those are never going to work for me. :-)

I’m sorry, Tiger is doing a pretty good job holding his end up but I have to chime in on this…

“given the CBS seems not only very happy with whatever viewership they have,”

And you know this, how? From what I can deduce, CBS is NOT getting the kind of numbers they were hoping for. The churn rate is probably a tone higher than they figured it would be. Hence the decision to expand the franchise to try and reduce it.

“(and I am not even including the very good reviews of the show across the professional reviewing community.”

Yes. There are some. But there are also a lot of mediocre and just plain scathing professional reviews out there. A quick google search shows this. Hence, mixed reviews is the most positive one could accurately say about how the show was received.

“This is my BELIEF…I cannot prove it,”

Thank you. That is the very first time I have read a post by you where you actually admitted you were speculating just like the rest of us. At least that.

ML31, I will happy to address the substance of your actual post here once I have that apology that you owe me for essentially lying (your exaggeration was so extreme that let’s be real, it’s a lie!) about what I had previously said to try to suck up to Tiger2 to, I would guess, “score some points” against me to make up for some past discussion you and I had that did not go so well for you?

Again, I never said “thousands of people” and you know it. THAT IS A HUGE, GROSS EXAGGERATION OF WHAT I SAID — an order of magnitude greater than what I said.

Still waiting for your apology???

I’ll give you a 2nd chance…

Do you deny that you claimed you personally spoke to enough people to draw a reasonable conclusion about how well STD has been received?

I never said “thousands of people” and you know it. THAT IS A HUGE, GROSS EXAGGERATION OF WHAT I SAID — an order of magnitude greater that what I said.

Waiting for your apology? Admit you lied here and put words in my mouth that I never said?

So you are doubling down. Fine. Deny that you said you have personally spoken to enough “fans” to have a viable sample to draw a statistical conclusion. I’m done. You have no credibility on this subject. Say what you will. I’m moving on.

I never said “thousands of people” and you know it. THAT IS A HUGE, GROSS EXAGGERATION OF WHAT I SAID — an order of magnitude greater that what I said.

Waiting for your apology????

ENT Season 4 suffered from.. Trek fatigue. And poor scheduling..

Agreed had Coto had ENT from the start, I think ENT would have been better than all the other series delivering on the pre TOS primitive humanity enters the final frontier concept.

If he had it from the start it would have been cancelled after the second season.

“If he had it from the start it would have been cancelled after the second season.”

You may be right on this. The two Coto seasons were actually where the show went into complete freefall and were like fan produced eps. As boring as Seasons 1 and 2 were, they were still credible as Star Trek.

@BorgKlingon It’s funny how the more fan service the show got with Coto the more it was liked by the fans. While at the same time the rating took a nosedive. That’s one of the reasons I don’t care about canon.

I can agree with this. I hated the premise of Enterprise but it was probably the only show that had the potential to really develop the history of Star Trek as we know and sadly they avoided that in its first two seasons. If season 4 was any indication we may have had an amazing show by the end.

Completely agree, Tiger2.

I’m a little perplexed by the other comments like one above about how it had been turned “a TOS fan service show” as if that was a bad thing.

The biggest complaints from very vocal Trekkies when the show first aired was that Enterprise wasn’t TOS enough… (“Voyager Lite” was one of the complaints I distinctly remember often back in 2001 and 2002).

Not all “fan service” is bad. Dropping in pointless Easter Eggs. and claiming they’re giving the fans what they want is bad fan service. Creating a reboot and recycling not only plots and characters but even iconic scenes is bad fan service.

I’d love the debate the specifics of the “fan service” of season 4 with people, figuring out what specifically people did not like about it. Personally, the final season did a good job attempting to show the trajectory towards TOS, laying a foundation showing what came before it and what would be coming up for this universe. At least a better job than than either the reboot movies or the “visual reboot” series has been able to do so far.

Yes and I’m someone who doesn’t have a lot of interest to retread TOS (which you can imagine how fun it is for me to watch Enterprise, the Kelvin films and now Discovery lol).

BUT if you are going to do it…then do it right! And that’s what I felt Enterprise was doing in its fourth season and that it was doing a great job of not only tying in seeds to TOS but the bigger Trek mythos overall. That’s what people were excited about when it came on. It kept being described as ‘birth of the Federation’ show. Thats what people wanted and instead we got the temporal cold war stuff and while I think it was interesting in the concept it just never felt that compelling. And they just waited to long to reveal who or what was behind it. I think for example if we knew it was a Romulan from the future trying to manipulate the past so the Romulans could win the upcoming war for example THAT would’ve been great and not the convoluted mess it ended up becoming.

They should’ve what they did in fourth season what they did in first season. Thats what the TOS fanboys wanted. So just GIVE it to them if you’re already going down this road.

First season should’ve started like Discovery did and start with the Romulan war. OR at the very least lay the seeds in the first season and build up to it like DS9 did so beautifully with the Dominion war. Very missed opportunity.

The Temporal Cold War concept, from what I heard, was forced upon the producers by UPN. For what that’s worth. One could argue that UPN poisoned the show while it was still in the fetal stage.

I know and in fact I always blamed network interference with Enterprise more then I did the show runners because it was clear they wanted a very different show than what we got but the network was really against having a prequel show and basically wanted another TNG show in the 25th century. Even though I don’t like prequels even I could understand why Berman didn’t want another show that went farther in the future at that time. It would’ve felt like the same thing with so many of the same people running it.

But the Enterprise premise became too watered down and it was clear UPN didn’t believe in the concept that much. Don’t get me wrong the show runners still are to blame for a lot of the decisions, mostly just avoiding their own premise early on, but they did want Enterprise to be unique and its own thing in the beginning which is what I think all shows should try to do even if they are part of a bigger franchise. Thats probably why DS9 will always be my favorite and because it WAS allowed to be different from the others.

Sadly with all the possible shows being planned none of them sound like they are taking any real risks with the franchise. All of them sound safe and familiar basically.

Get a room you two.

There was fan service in Enterprise. But being a prequel there were things that it just HAD to address. Hence, the fan service, I thought, was VERY organic. Unlike the so-called “easter eggs” in STD. Like the Lorca menagerie in his office. That was pointless and just plain dumb and made no sense. Even less sense once he was revealed to be what he was.

Well sadly they made everything which was interesting about Lorca pointless. But even before the big ‘reveal,’ the contents of his ‘secret lab’ didn’t make much sense.

Yeah I agree about Lorca. I actually LIKED the reveal he was from the MU but same time I would’ve been fine if that was just who he was as a person because it was a very different take on a Starfleet Captain. He was very anti-Picard which is definitely a risk but I think worked because even people who didn’t like the show much seem to love that character.

And my feeling was (before the reveal) they were going to soften him up a bit in time anyway but yeah.

Tiger, assuming Lorca was PU Lorca and remained the interesting guy, taking the character to the logical TV conclusion means yes, he would have HAD to soften up over time. We would have slowly learned what made him tick and he would have “grown” to overcome his shortcomings. They even did that with Picard a bit. When first introduced he was practically a grumpy old man.

True and as I said somewhere on this page why I really loved Picard. Because he did grow as a character. I think Lorca was probably originally meant to have a redemption arc (based on what they originally said about the character) who like Burnham had problems but would become a better person in time. I assumed that’s what they were going for when we learned he killed his entire crew but of course later we learn it was just to keep his true identity hidden.

Theoden, I don’t get the ENT fans service hate either. Discovery is fan service too. At least with Enterprise, Berman had the decency to wait 14 years before giving in to it in a major way.. after he’d exhausted his 24th century oeuvre

Exactly! Discovery did similar story lines what Enterprise did in season four: Mirror Universe, Klingons and Vulcan extremists. They are even bringing back Section 31 lol.

Discovery is doing nothing but fan service stories. Its two main story lines last season revolved around Klingons and the Mirror Universe. We already got TOS characters Sarek and Mudd and next season getting the Enterprise with Pike and most likely Spock (just younger).

I wouldn’t be surprised they won’t do another augment story or something on the Orions and Andorians.

And I’m not bothered by (most) of this because you expect stuff like this in a prequel. But people shouldn’t kid themselves Discovery is forging some new territory in its stories. Its based around all the popular stuff fans already like seeing as Enterprise did.

In fact the ONLY episode that presented something completely new to Star Trek was the episode where they went to the planet Phavo. But believe it or not that was the ONLY one that actually presented something new we never seen or heard of before. Oddly enough that happens to be the only one where they just visited a planet all season. Kind of makes you realize why exploration is so popular in Trek. ;)

+1

Agreed. Coto was good. The Forge written by Judith and Garfield Reeves-Stevens was the pinnacle. The follow-up written by Berman and Braga was crap. So get the Reeves-Stevens duo and Coto! What makes me nervous is all these soap/drama writers. Good Sci-fi writers can write good drama, but pure drama writers can’t necessarily produce good sci-fi. That’s why a Starfleet Academy show always makes me shudder. Nobody wants Dawson’s Creek Star Trek.

Roddenberry would turn in his grave knowing this utter clown is in charge of Trek.

A disgrace.

warning for trolling, no need to be rude about Kurtzman, and neither you, nor anyone else can speak for GR

thread closed

Good for Kurtzman.
Good for Star Trek fans.

Now we just need better writers who understand how to tell a story. And better production people who understand the importance of light. So that the audience will be able to see what the hell is going on rather than dark fuzzy cgi shots or dark fuzzy rooms.

If that’s done than it will be awesome news.

Great day for Star Trek, assuming of course that shows are actually made and don’t just end up in development hell.

What Kurtzman needs to do is get together some real, modern science fiction writers on board (People like John Scalzi, Andy Weir, James S.A Corey, Michael Stackpole, Kevin Anderson, Timothy Zahn etc..) involve them with the stories and get Trek back to its smart science fiction and exploration routines. The last thing I want is even more dumbed down Trek.

Agreed. I don’t love Kurtzman but this is an exciting day! Star Trek may just be getting started. I just hope they don’t limit themselves to just 23rd century stuff and with the announcement Picard is back in the mix it sounds like they are thinking bigger again at least.

I AM SO FUCKING HAPPY!!!!

Is there some specific reason why Ronald D. Moore is not involved with Trek anymore?

He’s busy with his own hit show. Would be cool if they got him involved in one of these new projects though.

Other person said it he has another show. And I think after what happened with Fuller they probably want people who will be devoted to Trek and only Trek. That’s why it took forever just to get another Kelvin film because those guys wer so busy with their other 20 projects. But if you’re going to be involved running a show it really should just be that one show.

I so want to be optimistic, but I can’t help but be reminded that Kurtzman=Into Darkness. I am setting the bar low but maintaining some optimism.

There is two other writers attached to Into Darkness, and JJ was probably involved in story development on it as well, so saying Kurtzman=Into Darkness isn’t exactly fair. Lot of cooks in the kitchen on that movie.

The funny thing is with a show there are TONS of cooks lol. A writers room usually have anywhere from 8 to 12 people throwing out ideas for a single episode. No one blinks over that but its no way you can write 20 episodes a year with just 3 or 4 people. That would be burn out.

But the fact is TV is literally written by a committee and it never seem to bother anyone. The trick is just getting the right committee to do it and a leader who can steer it in the right direction.

I hope they hire back some production staff who have previously worked on Trek. They know the franchise. Staying hopeful. I did not like Discover for canon/look/story reasons. Hope they lean into the old fanbase more.

God no. Keep those old farts away from Star Trek.

They already did for Discovery and they asked others to be involved like the Okudas but they simply turned it down.

But I was happy with what they did for Discovery and got back a few vetern Trek writers and managed to get Frakes involved to direct. My guess is there will be a mixture of old and new blood just like ALL the Trek shows got, from TNG through Discovery. That seems like the way to go.

Where the Okudas actually asked to be involved with the show? I remember seeing quotes about how they would be interested in being part of it if asked, but those were either before or early on in production.

I just want to make sure that this isn’t some kind of apocryphal story that became the truth somewhere down the line…

Thats what a poster mentioned in the other Discovery thread with the show runners leaving. They said the production asked them to be involved but they didn’t want to move to Canada for the show. Is it true or not, yeah who knows but I try and trust what people say here or at the very least they got it from somewhere even if the source is questionable.

Ok I went back and found that post since it was bothering me lol. The poster said the Okudas said it themselves on an episode of Engage. Now I have no idea what ‘Engage’ is lol but my guess a podcast or something. But that’s the source and the poster said it came directly from their mouths.

Thanks. I’m generally hesitant to believe something without being able to find it after a simple internet search to listen or read it with my own eyes, which is the only reason why I brought it up.

Lots of comments online are like a big game of telephone: “I heard this from so-and-so who heard it from so-and-so.” Thanks for digging a bit on the source.

No worries. Every time I post something here or anywhere I do try to be accurate as possible or at least back it up with a source. Even though I obviously never heard them say it I only repeated it because the poster made it clear they heard it directly themselves and said where. I hate the ‘I heard this from that guy who heard it from another guy’ stuff too. Its par for the course online of course but its how so many stupid rumors spread.

Phew, this could be … awesome! However the cautious half of cautiously optimistic is rather loud in my mind for two reasons:
Firstly, studios should let what’s happening to the Star Wars franchise at the moment be a warning.
Secondly, at the moment I’m still hoping for ONE well-written Trek show, my hope being that DISCO S2 might be this show. So “splitting up” my hopes doesn’t appear viable regarding my “emotional economic situation”… YET.
The possibilities though – My head’s spinning!

What happen with Star Wars is that they are trying to pump out these big movies every year and getting a lot of people who are fans of the franchise but little experience to make those big films. Add to the fact Kathleen Kennedy let them do basically whatever they wanted without a real plan and you have a making for a disaster. TLJ was a beautifully made film, people just thought the story sucked and it veered away from what TFA set up. My guess is if Johnson just fan boyed it up and gave them everything they wanted that film would be held as the best SW film since Empire (which oddly what most of the critics were saying).

But I will say Solo is kind of a warning shot, people just don’t want constant fan service and prequels either. Most thought it was good but it still the lack of interest should tell people just rehashing the background of an iconic character is not enough to get fans excited coughKhancough! ;)

Agreed.

I’m not too keen on attaching franchise fatigue with Star Wars, but I think that not having a game plan before starting TFA was a Starkiller Base-sized mistake.

I did not like most of the things they did with TFA when that film came out, but TLJ didn’t follow through with almost any of the “mystery boxes” that were set up in the previous film. I know some found that subverting our expectations that way was brilliant. I think that TLJ is just average, both as a movie and a Star Wars film. It doesn’t help that all these dangling threads and potential that TFA at least set up was squandered.

I think the prequels were a bit of a disaster, mostly bland (both in directing and in acting), but even walking out of Attack of the Clones and stating to my family that it was “the worst Star Wars movie”, I still wanted to see where it’s going in Episode III.

I actually really liked Rogue One (my 3rd favorite film of the entire franchise). I’m waiting for Solo to watch at home. They killed off Solo in TFA. I don’t care about how he became the person we saw in the original Star Wars after seeing him become a homeless space hobo in TFA. I have nothing left in me for that franchise. I hate coming across as jaded, but the franchise whittled my enthusiasm over the span of just only two “saga” films.

The economics behind Solo just weren’t there after the initial inflated budget, the reshoots, and everything else behind it. A modestly budgeted Star Wars film about Han Solo could have been a success.

Solo had a lot of things going against it – 2 directors fired and a lead actor who reportedly was channeling Ace Ventura in his performance. Combine this with a barely existent marketing campaign that went out it’s way not to showcase it’s star and the controversy created by the last instalment in the Skywalker saga and I think you have the reasons for the latest anthology movie bombing.

I think JAGT has a point about what’s happened with Star Wars serving as a warning though. This could have even played into CBS decision to part ways with their showrunners and I suspect will result in a greater effort to tie DSC in with the rest of their universe in order to bring back some of those fans that they’ve clearly alienated.

No I agree Solo had MANY MANY problems lol. But I do think the biggest being no one was really all that excited about a Han Solo prequel, especially without Ford. So it already had an uphill battle to convince people (like me) the movie was more than just a shameless cash grab riding on the name of a famous character. But when all those other things came into play it basically convinced others already on the fence to stay home.

I have to concede that point Tiger2 nobody (including myself) wanted or asked for a Han Solo movie. I I’d say that there was more interest in having Ewan McGregor reprise the role of Obi Wan and tell story’s set between trilogies but unfortunately the reception to Solo might just have harmed the chances of this happening for a while.

…which is truly a shame, because I would love to see a McGregor-led Obi-Wan standalone film.

Sadly looks like you were right Corinthian7:

http://collider.com/star-wars-spinoffs-on-hold/

Now it may not be true or maybe they are assessing things on what should move forward and what shouldn’t but clearly Solo had an impact for the worst.

@Tiger2 @Danpaine this is sad news. Hopefully it still happens once the dust settles as I do feel there were a lot of fans interested in seeing an Obi Wan movie whereas barely anybody outside of Lucasfilm thought a young Han Solo film was necessary.

@COrinthian7 — I sort of blame Abrams and Bad Robot. SOLO is like a kid-who-grew-up-with-the-original-Star-Wars idea of something nostalgic he always wanted to see. It’s the same kind of misguided thinking that brought us the US Space Force — something nobody wanted, or needed, especially now, but it satisfies some juvenile urge that always fascinated them.

That’s simply not the case regarding TLJ. Every second movie in the three SW trilogies has experienced a quite natural significant ratings decline from the first movie, and then the third movie recovers a bit, but still doesn’t match the first movies box office. Even ESB — check yourself if you don’t believe me. TLJ just continued this long established SW box office trilogy earnings trend.

Solo is a “one-off” bad example because the press had been so bad on this movie given the re-shoots, director replacement, etc, that it was bound to not do that great at the box office — anyone paying attention could see this coming a year ago. The unfortunate thing is that it is actually a pretty decent movie.

There is no SW decline outside of internet fanboy types claiming it must be so. I have yet to meet a person in “real-life” who did not like TLJ; all the hate seems to be in the internet exclusively, and when I saw it 3 times in the theaters, the audience clapped at the end each time — even including the third time which was like a month after release (extremely rare in my experience).

The final trilogy movie next year will do at least $1.5 Million globally, which will put this silly fanboy concept of a “SW decline” to bed once and for all.

While you may be right, I think you are underestimating the power of the “fans”. If they don’t like something, then they can certainly affect the overall takings of a film. Everything in the film industry depends on making a good film, if you don’t make a good product, it is bound to fail eventually. Now having said this, I actually liked TLJ more than TFA, but I also acknowledge the fact that it had some problems. It was at least 20 minutes too long and the Canto Bright sequence was not very necessary.

I didn’t hate TLJ either and I had no issues with how Luke died. But yes the film still had problems IMO, mostly the Canto Bright stuff and some of the more questionable plotting and character motivations.

Now I think the film could’ve still won people over despite those things if he made better character choices but it can’t be denied a lot of people really do hate the movie. But I don’t think ‘fatigue’ had anything to do with it, it just didn’t reach their expectations and they revolted.

Hmm, I found the general plot somewhat problematic. Namely that the whole film was just getting nowhere. Except for Rey’s arc – which basically amounts to finding out that she’s no one in particular – any individual character arcs felt weirdly circular: Finn and his new girlfriend set out to achieve… nothing. Then they come back. Poe gets a bit cocky and achieves… nothing. Then he’s redeemed. Supreme Leader Whatever Snoke uses the force to try stuff and achieves… nothing. Then he gets killed. Luke talks about how nothing really counts… and then becomes one with the force. That film was kinda frustrating.
And while it went easy on the “wink wink, geddit?”-type of reference-based fanservice, I feel that it delivered an entirely different type of fanservice, namely that someone got wind that fans were sensing a sort of sexual tension between Rey and Kylo in TFA and so this gets expanded upon in a rather cringey manner “Ewww, please put on a shirt!” (translation: “Ooooh, you’ve gotten buff!”)

I have no problem with the exploits that accomplished nothing. Sometimes that happens. Not everything has to pan out. I liked that Rey’s parentage is no one special. There are some things I did not like about it. It DID sag in the casino stuff. And it truly did have a “final episode” feel to it. Which I found a bit odd knowing episode 9 was coming. But overall I liked it more than TFA mainly because it was not a rehash of a movie we already saw. And I am forced to admit, I liked it better when I saw it a 2nd time on disc than I did when I saw it in the theater.

TFA had a lot of problems, of course. BUT it left me wanting to see more of those new characters! It really did: I found Kylo to be an interesting take on a Star Wars baddie, Finn could’ve had a lot going for him, Rey was a superb, likeable protagonist and Poe was Oscar Isaac (and that’s enough to keep me invested, because he’s just a great actor).
In the end, TLJ didn’t do a lot of favours to either of those characters and honestly, it left me just a lot LESS interested in them.

By the way: Why are we talking Star Wars? – Oh yes, because I feel that as a franchise it’s just slowly getting “sapped” by rehashes, twists, turns and spinoffs.

On the face of it sounds like great news for Trek, just hope they don’t spread themselves too thinly and then we end up with even more diluted Trek. I’d be happier to have CBS and Paramount unified, an exceptionally thought provoking (dare I say optimistic/real science fiction) single Star Trek TV series running concurrently with movies every 2-3 years but maybe I’m just harking back to the golden age of Trek?

It sounds like some of the potential shows wil have their own separate showrunners. For example, the starfleet academy show would be led by Josh Schwartz. I think if Kurtzman Justin oversees the shows but doesn’t get into the small details of each show, that would make more sense.

YES!

This all sounds like fantastic news! The thought alone of Patrick Stewart back as Picard is what I have hoped for ever since All Good Things!

Wow. Looks like the franchise has been kicked into transwarp! Let’s hope everyone involved realizes the incredible responsibility they have to not only the fans but to the legacy of the entire franchise. I hope it’s done right — we don’t just need Star Trek we need Star Trek with good, quality storytelling that echoes the soul of what Star Trek is all about.

Regardless — I think it’s time to celebrate! Anyone for a bottle of Andorian ale?!

Also I wish they’d do an Enterprise miniseries :) bring back the old cast for a proper send off.

Agreed on all points. A Romulan war mini series heavily featuring the NX-01 series could be great.

I can already hear the haters chewing the carpet. Great news about Kurtzman.

Great news. I can’t wait.

WoW just wow.. I never thought I’d see Star Trek back up to warp speed again.

Bring it on!

A Patrick Stewart led series would be wonderfull!

I really hope that it is more than just a cameo thing…

A return of Patrick Stewart would be amazing, but I just cannot believe it will ever happen.

Its Star Trek, anything is possible!

So he became the new Rick Berman?

Berman was a hack.

and Kurtzman isn’t?

He certainly was NOT a hack!!!

He was so paranoid about involving anything from TOS in a positive way, that he had Sarek die on-screen with not even getting to see Spock (with Nimoy actually cast in the same freaking two-part episode???), and then giving the great Captain Kirk that horribly inconsequential death on what looked like Home Depot painters scaffolding…WTF was that?

I can never forgive Berman for these insults to past Trek.

Two great reasons for Berman to never again be involved with anything Star Trek, BorgKlingon. Absolutely right. “Bridge on The Captain!”

Yep!

BorgKlingon & Danpaine,

I concur.

He kind of already was being involved with the Kelvin films first and then overseeing Discovery. Its kind of funny I actually said a few days ago I can see him having Berman’s old job. Now it looks like its true, at least on the TV front. But I don’t see how this would stop him being involved in the movies again since he and Orci did created the Kelvin universe. It is weird out of all people its Kurtzman taking the lead.

@Tiger2,

I read some comments by Orci in the producers thread where he seemed open to work on ‘Discovery’ if Kurtzman needed “Fresh eyes!”

You never know. I mean with SO much Star Trek coming up and since they shared a long history with Trek and all the other films and movies they worked on I wouldn’t be too shocked if Orci came aboard.

End of the day, this is all about money. And the first two Kelvin films were a success. Not huge but profited. I think if one called the other and with all of these Trek projects popping up now I don’t see why he couldn’t be involved.

Yes. Many people said Trek needed a new Rick berman. Now they have it. Could have been that other bad robot partner but it isn’t. Too bad.

@JAM — I disagree. I think Trek dodged a bullet with that one.

So apparently if you are not happy with this news you get warned. What’s up with that? We have to be Kutzman sycophants now?? Theman’s record is awful. Almost nothing but dumbed down garbage. This is what Pascale and co want their Trek to be??? Unreal.

It’s because most people think that Kurtzman can’t ruin them all

Besides the more that’s made the higher the chance they actually might make something good.

That is true. The more darts you throw the more chances one of them might hit the target. I just hope it happens sooner rather than later.

Even a broken clock is right twice a day!

Stop being a troll.

I’m not trolling. I said he was a clown. People are calling Rick Berman a hack and get no warning!

That’s unfair….and you of all people should know how unfair that is since it is you that is constantly trolling this site with your “all Trek before 2010is garbage” nonsense. That gets a pass but me being legitimately upset that a person with such bad record as Kurtzman has been given the keys to the kingdom is off limits? That’s out of order. I mean Trek 90210 by the makers of the awful Dynasty reboot I’m supposed to be happy about???? Nobody sees how awful that sounds but me?? Am I in the mirror universe????

Jesus.

@El Chup You need Jesus.

Well, let me know when he returns and I’ll book an appointment.

You’re talking to him.

I’m saying this with a straight face but I heard the Dynasty reboot is actually good.

And I think people should be able to express how they feel, agreed. I think its just a matter of personal insults which is where the issue is coming from. I know this is going to be hard to believe but all my time here discussing Star Trek from every show and film I have never ever used the word ‘hack’ when discussing a writer, producer or director. That’s not a ‘bad’ word of course but what I’m saying is people can be critical without all the triggering that goes on the internet. I thought Berman did a generally great job but he stayed on the job too long IMO. I don’t love Abrams and the Kelvin films but I understand they tried to do something a bit different. I don’t love Discovery and I have been critical of the people who run that but I think their hearts are in the right place, but I just don’t think they really ‘get’ Star Trek frankly. Luckily they are gone now. And the show had one season. This is Star Trek, they usually get better, right? It doesn’t mean everyone loves it but it does mean they DO listen to the fanbase and they try to improve.

But sadly Trek fandom is like Star Wars fandom. Ok not THAT bad lol but its pretty close. I think Kelvin and Discovery has really divided fandom sadly and my guess whatever we get next will further that divide.

But for me, I WANT Star Trek to succeed. I agree with a lot of people who has issues with Discovery, but I don’t want the show cancelled, I just want it to improve. Thats what we should all be aiming for end of the day.

As fans we can be critical without being insulting. We can have issues with a show but hope it gets better. We can certainly dislike particular writers and directors but still remember they want the best for the franchise.

But to just hate, hate, hate doesn’t get us anywhere. Star Trek has a beautiful and rich history. No matter how people feel about one particular show or films there is still way more to like out there than to hate. And that says a lot for a franchise that’s given us over 700 hours of content (and counting ;)).

With you on most of that Tiger. Who we are provided with as show runner is a fait accompli now. What they put on the screen is ultimately the thing on which they will be judged.. I have doubts and hopes in equal measure at the moment.

“I’m not trolling. I said he was a clown.”

You are throwing Mr. Pascale under the bus here by using selective quoting to leave out most of your personal attack on Mr. Kurtzman — you also made unseemly references to Mr. Roddenberry’s burial, inferred that that you speak for Mr. Roddenberry, and called Mr. Kurtzman a disgrace.

If you must whine about this, then please at least take accountability for all of what you said. It was MUCH, MUCH MORE than simply referring to Mr. Kurtzman as “a clown,” and you know that.

I’m quite excited by the prospect. I think the implication is that we’ll get different types of shows that will target specific demographics whilst also bringing in a more general Trek audience. The Acadamy show will likely have a younger bent but could potentially still appeal to older fans by incorporating elements from the old Harve Bennett project that had been originally planned as the 6th movie. The Picard series would likely be targeting long term fans and be more faithful to the Trek we know whilst still introducing a more modern storytelling approach. Of course they may turn out to be garbage but at the moment I choose to be optimistic. I take your point though, we’re all fans here who are passionate about Trek and are entitled to our own opinions.

PLEASE STOP THESE TROLLING PERSONAL ATTACKS ON ALEX KURTZMAN.

This behavior is out of bounds.

Sounds like a smorgasbord of delights, but I don’t know… Its a thin line between hearty eating and sheer gluttony. Hmmmn…

Fan. Don’t forget to cite the difference between a supermarket ready meal, a big Mac, and even foie gras..

Well spotted, DPrescott…

YEEEEEEEESSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSSS!!!!!!!!!

Although I’m not completely happy Kurtzman is the one leading all of this I can’t help but to be excited about the possibilities. TWO Trek shows airing at the same time and hopefully its a series that goes forward again. And we still have the Kelvin movies. Its starting to feel like the 90s again!

The one with Khan though, ugh, but it would be exciting to see Picard back! OMG, Star Trek is ramping up again

It would work if the spin-off show airs during the Discovery off-season. The only thing I’m mad about is having to wait until 2019 for new Discovery. Having a Star Trek show or miniseries to fill the gap would have been nice.

It truly is exiting times for those of us that have embraced Trek in all it’s incarnations. I don’t think we really need the Khan series either, at least not the Ceti Alpha show. If you’re gonna do Khan you might as well at least give us the Eugenics Wars! However the Picard series really does have me buzzing as this is something I’ve been suggesting on here for a longtime. Who knows, if is successful we could get a limited run follow up to DS9 or finally see the NX-01 in action during the Romulun war.

Exactly! For most of us that love it all (or most of it ;)) this is great news. To have Picard back the internet is now buzzing. They are freaking out at Reddit but in a good way lol.

Bringing back an actor who many see as an embodiment of the franchise is probably the biggest news since Nimoy came back to do the first Kelvin movie. I’m the guy who says I want something new and I do but yes I can’t help to be giddy with the news only because I never really saw Picard or anyone from TNG coming back. At best I thought they may do a TNG reboot (which I DON’T want) but to hear this is utter joy. I nearly peed in my pants when I saw Kurtzman and Picard in that photo lol. And yes it could lead to others like DS9 or even Enterprise. I’m not holding my breath for any of it but its clear now the door is open for anything. CBS wants to be back in the Trek business full time now so lets see where it all goes.

But no the Khan idea just completely puts me off. Its the only one out of all those ideas that I just roll my eyes at. I can accept all of them, even the Academy one, but don’t waste resources and budget on a character that died over 30 years ago and had a very tiny influence in the overall franchise. We all love Khan but when Montalban played him. Its now time to let go and do something unique. I think STID made clear how people felt about redoing Khan but we have to remember its Kutzman who pushed for Khan in that film. So I guess I shouldn’t be shocked he’s now pushing for this.

I will agree though if they HAVE to do Khan then give us the Eugenics war. People have always wanted that and I even developed fan fiction (in my head lol) how they could’ve done it on Enterprise. No Ceti Alpha V stuff. If you are going to do Khan then give us the story of KHAN, how he rose to power and nearly conquered Earth. Do a limited series and maybe people will get into that at least.

I guess I’m in the minority when it comes to seeing Picard back on TV Trek. I really don’t want to see Picard any longer. I actually don’t see any place for him in any Trek incarnation with the possible exception of voicing him in an animated show about some lost TNG years or something. I’d rather see the Khan show than a Picard show. But that is not the first time my personal view has been squarely in the minority.

But we already know Khan’s story. That’s the problem for people, its ALREADY been told. Basically all we would get are the details which I just don’t care about.

You said you’e not a big TNG fan so I can understand why you are not excited about seeing Picard but sure if you ARE a TNG fan this is amazing news. And I think a lot of people really hated Nemesis and see this as a possibility of ending that crew right. Of course none of this means it will be directly TNG related or that we will see other characters but unless they pull a Prime Spock or Kirk and have him show up in another time or place interacting with a different crew it would be odd it wouldn’t be a continuation of TNG in some form.

Yes, we do already know Khan’s story. And that should tell you how much I really don’t want to see a Picard show. My problem is Picard is boring. He always has been to me. Ironically while Picard was perhaps the 3rd most boring character in TNG, he was played the what was by far the very best actor thus far in all Trek shows. Making him watchable. But to me, the TNG stories have all been told. I see no reason to revisit them just as I think the TOS stories have all been told and see no reason to revisit THEM. Who I still think have more potential then TNG characters have. And to this day I do not see why Nemesis garners so much hate. Save for one segment I thought it a very entertaining film that wrapped things up for TNG quite well. Different strokes I guess.

I didn’t like Picard originally and I think he was pretty unlikable in the beginning but like the show itself he just really grew on me. He is definitely my favorite Captain out of them all. But yes he’s not Kirk lol. Not even Sisko. Those guys were more fiery and of course Kirk is just a guy you want to sit and have a beer with.

But I like Picard because he was so introspective and analytical but then he did evolve to be more fun and open to the crew in time. That’s why that last scene in All Good Things was so memorable because it was Picard finally just looking at his crew like a family. It took almost the destruction of humanity but it happened lol. You really did see an evolution to the character from being so standoffish and pretty arrogant in many ways but then learned to be more relaxed and open.

As far as TNG stories all been told we actually don’t disagree. As I have said I have NEVER wanted another TNG iteration no more than I wanted a TOS one. But yes IF they have to go this direction then sure I would welcome a TNG one versus yet ANOTHER TOS version since we have the Kelvin films for those.

But I been pretty consistent on this if it comes down to doing brand new stories with new characters vs rehashing old ones I would pick the former every single time, no question. But its pretty clear in a lot of those story ideas most of these will probably crossover with other known characters in some form. I’m betting the animation show will just be an updated TAS.

So if they are going to do it then obviously I would want them to do it with characters I like and miss. And having Picard is a possible doorway to post-Nemesis stories which so many of us want again.

I hope one of the series is a spin-off with Captain Pike.

Looking forward to a Starfleet Academy and a new animated series.

Me too, a Pike series using a more episodic model would be the ideal sister show to Discovery’s more serialised approach.

An ideal to show Spock’s journey from emotional to calm and logical. In the original pilot, he was emotional.

Rick Berman said in hindsight one of the biggest MISTAKES he made in the 90s was trying to run two Star Trek shows on television CONCURRENTLY. Obviously this dunce Kurtzman learned nothing from that. If you want a new Star Trek show, cancel STD and hire a REAL “showrunner” for the new show who understands and respects Gene Roddenberry’s vision.

Lame outrage

Thank you. At least someone else sees it.

I guess you’ve never heard of the MCU or Arrowverse. The TV and movie landscape has changed a lot since the 90’s and I think it’s the ideal time for the original shared universe to make a comeback. Also I think it’s unlikely these will all run concurrently as CBS will want to spread it’s content throughout the year.

Yeah but MCU and DC changed the game to that. And don’t forget this is CBS we are talking about. I have been saying this for literally a year but this is the same company that had three CSI shows, three NCIS shows and three Criminal Mind shows ALL running at the same time. In fact all the NCIS shows are still running. This is also the company that owns CW and has FOUR DC shows all running there and interconnected. But they have a total of six DC shows now on that network.

And people think having two Star Trek shows on is somehow bad? I mean this is what TV is NOW, just like films in general, its all about branding and interconnections. If you do it RIGHT then the sky is the limit.

I have always saw this coming. It was never an if but a when. But even I didn’t see it coming at THIS level lol. It sounds like they not only want another full time show but mini-series happening as well. So it could actually be more than two Trek shows on but maybe up to three or four, just the others more limited.

Tiger2,

Re: This is also the company [CBS] that owns CW…

CBS does NOT own THE CW. Last I checked, it is now a joint venture between AT&T and CBS with CBS’ stake in it likely to be bought out by the AT&T behemoth when all the WB merger dust settles by the end of this month.

OMG, OK, joint venture. You love splitting hairs.

@Disinvited — you think ATT will buy out the CBS share of the CW? It’s not really the market they want to get into with this purchase.

WB is creating 3 new shows for its DC streaming platfrom just this year, and RIVEDALE’s ratings are fairly sub-par on the CW but through the roof on NETFLIX. In fact most of the DC series have a far stronger online presence than with the CW.

Curious Cadet,

Content is king and AT&T didn’t enter in this merger just to exploit one vertical market.

“Rick Berman said in hindsight one of the biggest MISTAKES he made in the 90s was trying to run two Star Trek shows on television CONCURRENTLY”

That’s hilarious, because by doing that, he had to take a hands-off appraoch to DS9, which then gave us the best Trek series since TOS.

Thank God Berman decided to run two at once, and thus had to let “the artists” create and run DS9 while he drove Voyager into the ground as as a bland series of recycled TNG plots.

So I would CONVERSELY argue that, INADVERTENTLY, “trying to run two Star Trek shows on television CONCURRENTLY” was Rick Berman’s greatest contribution to the Trek franchise, unintended as it was.

You do make a valid point, Kurtzman will only have a peripheral involvement in all of these new shows as they’ll each have their own showrunner and distinctive flavour. I get that DSC is divisive and not everybody has taken to it but that’s no reason not to at least be cautiously optimistic about the latest developments.

JUST DO THE PICARD THING. LEAVE EVERYTHING ELSE. THE PICARD IS OUR GOD.

Old fart Picard will be boring.

On one hand it’s good to have some new Trek set in different eras but on the other hand there is Kurtzman. Perhaps if Kurtzman was in charge only of the business aspects of the shows and hired good writers, things would look better.

Looking at the rumored new shows, Starfleet Academy, a Khan & a third one presumably involving Picard, only the Picard show sounds interesting to me. Don’t really care about yet another Khan-centric show/movie, or an Academy show made by people behind Dynasty & Gossip Girl.

Kurtzman won’t be showrunner on each show, in fact I’m pretty confident he’s only fulfilling the role on DSC as a stop gap. I agree that it’s the Picard show that is most appealing to me, I’d have rather we got the Pike series rather than Starfleet Acadamy but I’ll give it a chance and at least Meyer is involved in developing the Khan project.

Don’t forget there is another show they are hinting at but is completely under wraps so that could be something that’s actually, dare I say it, new and inventive. In other words maybe a show that can just be in its own period with its own crew and not have so and so character be Scotty’s cousin.

So I’m holding out we may get something new and innovative but yes I agree the one that interest me the most is the Picard one. I think that’s the one that has gotten the most attention and for good reason. Not interested in Khan at all.

I got the impression that one of the shows that is under wraps is the Picard limited series and the other is the animated show but maybe I read that wrong. My gut feeling is that we’ll never return to the old 7 season format of the Berman era and we’ll have a constant revolving door of limited/event series and flagship shows that last 3-4 seasons.

I agree with this but I think that’s just TV in general today. More and more shows are producing less episodes a season and there are less of them lasting 5+ seasons. With streaming less has become more in many ways.

I still want a long running Trek show but I can understand doing it this way with a few shows limited to 8 episodes and going a few seasons. They feel more like an event and basically one big movie. And since people binge watch more today they know most people will just wait until the season is over and watch it straight through.

Agreed.

Throw in a bit about Sir Patrick Stewart to add some excitement as more ‘product’ from the guy behind Discovery isn’t going to excite… I worked in PR and know how it works. I don’t trust Kurtzman and he definitely doesn’t care enough about preserving the tone of Trek, IF we get anything, it will be more generic action sci-fi that could belong to any franchise. He and the team of hipsters he recruits will continue to reboot, reinvision and reimagine and disregard the rich 50 year tapestry they could of continued to build on. I am so sad for Trek today. As if his work on the JJ-verse movies or Discovery isn’t evidence enough at where Trek is heading. Just give us Deep Space Nine and Voyager on blu-ray and we promise not to let the door hit us on our way out…

Agree with you, but is over man, we loss.. JJ Trek and Disco crap won…. a sad day for Star Trek.

Anyway, they wont took our DVDs from us, Picard will allwais be TNG Picard for me.

Me and all the winners are getting laid tonight.

Holy cow!!!! This is wonderful. I’ve been hoping for years that someone would give the attention to Trek that Disney gives to SW. exciting!!!

Kurtzman is the WRONG choice for Star Trek. The franchise should`ve been turned over to someone that can take Star Trek into the future while respecting established canon. To me, Star Trek is an AWESOME saga that began in 1966, with every series and film (to 2005) a chapter in that saga; it should be continued and honored, not discarded and disrespected (via the foul abramsverse and “discovery”). Just my two darseks.

@Duncan Webb — Could be worse, could have been Orci.

“According to CBS, Kurtzman will be developing new Star Trek series, mini-series and other content opportunities, including animation.”

I want them to redo TAS with better animation and using the existing audio.

I’d be down with that! A TAS 2 based around the second 5 year mission would work for me as well.

@navamske — My guess is that they’ll redo this in about 10-15 years when the CGI has improved enough, and is cheap enough that they can literally re-animate it as a live-action series, and give us the real 4th season of TOS.

If Deadline is accurate, we’re going to find out more information about the limited series in July at SDCC.

===============================
Deadline:

“There are no specifics about any of the projects at the moment though there is talk that one of the first shows would be an eight-episode limited series spinoff. Kurtzman and Co. may reveal some details at the upcoming Comic-Com convention.

GREAT news!!!! I was waiting for comic con to get some Avengers 4 news lol. Now this will definitely be top of my list.

Great piece of news. Thanks!

I totally forgot about this but Kurtzman also co-created and wrote episodes for a show called Fringe. IMO this was one of the best science fiction series of the past decade. I may not be a big fan of some of the more pedestrian broadcast tv shows like Hawaii Five-O but Fringe is a past credit that he should shout about and be proud of!! Oh yeah, it didn’t hurt that Leonard Nimoy was also part of Fringe.

Fringe was very good, still miss that show.

Fringe is what excited me about them making the first Kelvin movie. I still think its their best show, bar none.

And it proves these guys know how to do sci fi. They didn’t write the show but they had input in creating it.

Fringe and also Lost were what had me excited.

Another Fringe fan here, and I agree, one of the best sci-fi offerings of the past ten years.

Loved Fringe. It improved exponentially after finding its feet in its 2nd season..

Man… Just when I thought things couldn’t get any worse.

I’m finding myself at this point actively disliking CBS. They killed the one show that was true to the values and sensibilities of Trek (Star Trek Continues), even though it was literally a non-profit charity case, just because they could. And what they offer up as officially licensed Trek drama leaves everything to be desired. And now they’re tripling down on that vapidity.

And at the other end of the block, we’ve got Disney killing what’s left of the Star Wars legacy. And it’s two guys responsible for all of the badness—Kurtzman and Abrams—the same two (out of three) that ruined the Trek movies. It all reminds me of a banana republic where the same small group of oligarchs rotate in and out of power for decades. Well, at least The Expanse has been picked up by Amazon. The sci-fi flame has greatly dwindled over the past decade, but it’s not yet out!

TRUTH!

hoo boy, here we go, another out of touch ‘fanboy’ who is pissed that things change with the times. If my OG Trekie Mother In Law can root for the cheer and love Star Trek Discovery (and the characters and messages therein), after having TOS not only influence her life but the lives and morals of her father, her friends, my wife, and you say it’s nothing of value to the franchise, than either your standards are way way too high or, more likely, you are looking for something that was never in Trek to begin with.

Mystical,
I am appalled by that comment and your tone. I too have had very close relatives who claimed to be moved and motivated by TOS way back when, and yet they have over the last couple of decades demonstrated NONE of the virtues they supposedly thought so highly of when it came to the real world and how they treated people with different skin, inclinations and values. And the only one of those I still have even minimal contact with just loves DSC, so all this indicates to me is … people can go bad on you, in taste and action.

I swear, I wish the forum could just ban the meanspirited use of the ‘fanboy’ phrase, since it is obviously intended to be incendiary like a trekkie n-word, and is also quite incorrect, as CYG is one of the sharper posters that has ever been on this board. And as to your crack about having standards way too high … well, that is likely the only way to keep them out of the gutter.

MysticalDigtial

I don’t know what your mother-in-law has to do with anything, but I do have high standards. I’ll plead guilty to that. However, they’re high based on the high water marks of Trek. And what I’ve seen of DSC hasn’t even been compelling enough to motivate me to continue watching. The plots weren’t terrible, the production values are obviously good, but the characters aren’t interesting or even relatable. There’s a strange absence of humanity—of the human condition—about the show. The drama feels contrived, lacking in truth, non-resonant. And as for meaningful themes, I don’t recall any. With regard to the JJ-Trek movies, I’ve given very specific and lengthy explanations for why they don’t work. But, honestly, I found DSC so uninteresting that I lack the will to re-visit the series even for the purposes of critical analysis, an activity in which I normally revel like a pig in slop. Plus, I’m obviously not going to pay for the pleasure of doing so. Though, I wouldn’t mind reading other peoples’ more detailed analyses of why they don’t like it. And I agree with kmart—you really shouldn’t label people “fanboy” dismissively. It’s a stupid thing to say to someone that you know nothing about, and you discredit yourself in so doing.

Cygnus. I think the new regime would like to synthesise out the humanist aspect of Trek.. Sadly, when you do that, what’s left isn’t really Trek. It’s Post Trek, maybe..

While I liked DIS more than you did but I think what you said about watching is again is how I KNOW I didn’t really like the season overall as I hoped. Because four months since it ended, I’ve only rewatched four of the episodes. I have watched WAY more TNG, DS9 and even ENT episodes lately that I have already seen over and over for years than episodes of DIS I only seen once.

Maybe I guess it is the serial nature of the show that’s harder to just watch them individually. BUt I don’t want to watch the whole thing from the beginning. I have no desire to. Compare that with DS9 which I have watch that entire series four tines. And I’m thinking of doing it again soon!

I think the Klingon war arc just really put me off. And how it was resolved makes me want to watch it even less. I REALLY hope its less Klingon stuff next season at least.

If DS9 ever got the Blu ray treatment I just might consider purchasing it. The only Trek shows I own are the BD remastered TOS and seasons 3 and 4 of Enterprise. And I bought that Best of Both Worlds part 1 & 2 disc.

I have no desire to ever watch DSC season one again. Chalked off, in my book. However, a good example of making lemonade out of lemons is Fear The Walking Dead. Seasons 1 and 2 were pretty wobbly, season 3 was better, but season 4 has been incredible. The show has totally reinvented itself. But like Discovery, I’ll probably never go back and watch season 1 of FTWD again.

I absolutely adore PARKS & REC, and recently rewatched almost all of it, but migod, season 1, brief as it is, plays just horribly! Have no idea how they got to s2 based on how bad it is.

Then again, I’ve never gotten into any incarnation of THE OFFICE, and am constantly distracted by the camera in MODERN FAMILY, since its presence essentially ruins most every comedic premise (phil trapped somewhere, but the camera PRECEDED him in there.)

As much as dislike this news I am not sure it’s fair to say CBS killed Continues. I think you have to point the finger at Alec Peters for that one.

El Chup

That’s what CBS would like you to think, I’m sure. But, CBS was OK with STC for years. Did anything about STC or their practices change that caused CBS to do what it did? No. Nothing changed. CBS used AXANAR as an excuse to kill the entire Trek fan film culture with their list of requirements that prohibited, among others, STC’s way of raising money and producing TOS-length episodes, even though STC had nothing to do with AXANAR and wasn’t committing any of the legal transgressions that AXANAR was. So, it is entirely fair to place the responsibility with CBS. It was their decision to put the kibosh on The Golden Age of Fan Films. They did it because they could.

That’s not really fair. The force awakens was 1000 times better than the prequels. And 1000000 times better than George’s plans for the sequels.

To premptively hate what they come up with for Trek without knowing anything is pretty negative.

JAM

I agree it’s negative, but it’s also a pattern. How many JJ-Trek movies with the same, signature badness do I have to watch before I can expect the next one to follow suit? I’ve seen three. Most people would call three things of like kind a pattern. TFA is a shameless rip-off of the original trilogy, and killing off Han like they did is an absolute travesty. It’s TFA’s variation of Kirk falling off the foot-bridge in GENERATIONS. (Han also dies on a foot-bridge in TFA, doesn’t he?) The prequels are extremely flawed, but at least they’re original stories.

Absolutely agreed, while the prequels had questionable aspects, they were still much more original than what we got with the sequel trilogy. I just don’t like this tradition of not expanding the universe of these big tentpole science fiction properties. Star Wars, Star Trek, etc.. all have to potential to go to totally alien and imaginative places, yet they seem to revel in doing the same things over and over again. It seems that all the writers and producers in Hollywood seem to have come down with a plague of unoriginality and creative blandness.

alphantrion

You’ve just described the symptom of 21st Century Hollywood. I’m tempted to blame excessive corporatization and its accompanying mindset for the lack of originality, as that seems to fit that pattern that we’ve been seeing. Large corporations are conservative by nature. They tend not to invent things but rather to buy things already invented and then sell them with slight modifications on a regular basis. Of course, there are exceptions, like Apple, which grew into a large corporation while Steve Jobs was still at the helm—but what have they invented since Jobs’ died? They’ve just been modifying the iPhone every year, a product that was invented under Jobs. Hence, instead of inventing new franchises, the big studios are just re-packaging and re-selling franchises that they’ve purchased from creative visionaries like Roddenberry and Lucas.

cont… The JJ-Trek movies are a “soft reboot” (not sure who coined that term, but it’s apropos). The JJ Star Wars movies are also a soft reboot—virtually a remake, in fact. Notice a pattern within that pattern? JJ Abrams is producing all of it. And why do you suppose that big corporations like CBS love working with JJ Abrams and Alex Kurtzman so much? My guess is because they fit well with the corporate mindset. They specialize in the sort of non-creative, repackaging that big data shows is a safe bet for the shareholders of Disney, CBS and so forth. The last thing that Disney and CBS want to invest in is a creative firebrand who’s out to realize his original cinematic vision on-screen, because that’s uncharted territory, which is risky. What great movie franchises have been created in the 21st Century? Star Trek, Star Wars, Alien, Terminator, Indiana Jones… these franchises were all created 35+ years ago and are being re-packaged, rebooted and/or sequelled in the 21st Century. If anybody knows a cause to this malady besides excessive corporatization, I’d like to know it.

Actually, there is one 21st Century exception that I can think of: Ron Moore’s re-imagining of Battlestar Galactica.

Interesting stance there, Cygnus. Good points, well taken.

Danpaine

Cheers.

As dubious a fan production as Axanar was reported to be, I still enjoyed the teaser they made more than I’ve enjoyed any single episode of Discovery. As a fan film it was encroaching into the discovery era but imho doing it better.. I can see why the studio had to kill it, rights issues notwithstanding.. It would be embarrassing to have fans producing better quality episodes than the official producers..

That was one impressive teaser. Agreed.

DS9 left the most story untold, and has the greatest potential to be revisited. That would excite me more than anything, returning to DS9 even if just for a mini-series or single television movie.

While I’m glad there is more Trek on the horizon, this sounds like too much within to short of a time meaning people will get burned out on Trek. To much leaves little anticipation time leading to less interest.

I don’t think they are ALL going to happen. It sounds like this is some of the ideas they are considering. My guess we may get one or two of them but I doubt all five. Remember none of these has been officially greenlit. Until that happens its all just blue sky stuff.

I think the problem is that with the success of the Marvel content very studio now wants a mega-franchise. I think Star Wars is already showing that to be risky.

The irony of course is that over-saturation was one of the things that helped kill Berman Trek.

I think the problem with Star Wars is a lot more than over saturation.

Franchise fatigue was not and is not a thing. Quality is the thing. Make good Trek and people will watch it. In this binge culture, you don’t think people could speed through 3 different concurrent series?

More likely its just that not all fans like all types of Trek, but the solution to that it more and different Trek so that there are greater chances of piquing fan interests. With subscription services (and the inherent tracking that comes from them), CBS can see what segments of the fandom are watching what shows. Much like how TV in general has specialized seeking niche audiences, the different Trek shows could capture segments of the fandom that like different elements.

For instance: I have never been a big fan of the Academy idea, and if they do a Khan show I want to see the Eugenics Wars (but not the “secret war” approach they took in the books), but I might watch them anyway provided they are of good quality. And I am sure there are large segments of the fanbase that each see those concepts as their favorites of those being developed now, and would prioritize them – while only checking out my preferred shows if they were of good quality.

About time we got a new animated Trek series. I hope it is CGI and about time we get a Star fleet Academy show.

Excited about all the live action projects announced. Loath the idea of animated Star Trek. Cheapens the universe to depict it in animation. And while I enjoy Star Wars Rebels, I’m bothered that it’s considered cannon on par with the films and coming live action TV series

Agreed, Luke. However, I have no problem ignoring the animated Star Wars material altogether in favor of the live action – don’t feel like I’m missing anything.

I agree about the animation show as well. In fact I have never seen a single episode of TAS even though I can watch it any time. I just never had any motivation to watch it.

But I can understand why CBS is doing this because we have to remember just like the Star Wars cartoons they AREN’T aimed at us, they are there to attract kids first and foremost. Obviously many adults watch stuff like Rebels but I watched a few episodes of it and its clearly not for someone my age, its designed to get younger ones into the SW universe. And they are cheaper to do.

I guess because Clone Wars and Rebels are ‘canon’ it makes people feel like they have to watch them but its not like you have to watch those to understand whats happening in the movies. It seems to be done that way on purpose. For example I didn’t know Saw Guerra came from The Clone Wars until after I saw Rogue One. THat said Solo sort of change that game lol. I’m sure everyone knows what I’m talking about but spoilers and all.

Ha, I didn’t know Saw Guerra was from Clone Wars until now! Actually, TAS is kind of interesting to watch if you can get over the clunky animation because in many cases the stories were written by many of the same people who wrote for TOS. That said, I don’t watch it much.

Walter Koenig wrote “The Infinite Vulcan” in TAS. Which I thought was a bit funny as Checkov wasn’t even on the show!