In the latest issue of the official Star Trek Magazine, Trek’s long-time producer Rick Berman talks about the end of his era. SciFi Pulse has excepts from the article where Berman defends his tenure and discusses why the last Trek TV show (Enterprise) failed. Berman says that the rumors of his hating The Original Series (TOS) are not true, but that doesn’t mean he has seen all of it:
There was a feeling that Enterprise was going to be a show that was a precursor to The Original Series, and although I’ve read a lot of depictions of both Brannon and myself ‘hating’ the original series, that could not be farther from the truth. We were not obsessed by the original series. I can openly admit that I did not see all 79 episodes of the original series, or 80 if you include the various versions of the pilot, but it was something we respected and did our best to lead up to. But I think that was something that was unsettling for the fans.
Not to jump on the ‘bash Bermaga bandwagon’, but it is not unreasonable to expect the creators and producers of a TOS prequel to have at least seen all of TOS.
Berman draws the distinction between Enterprise’s characters and those of the TOS and TNG eras:
They weren’t from the distant future as much. And we felt we could have more of a contemporary television show and less of a show-taking place in the distant future, something a little different from the Roddenberry humans of the 23rd Century or even the 24th Century who were pretty flawless. From that point of view, these were the choices at the time that seemed very reasonable and I would probably do again. But it had pitfalls and maybe at times it became a bit too casual, and a bit too contemporary, and lost some of its science fiction flavour and some of its futuristic flavour that would make it a precursor to the original series. It certainly had its problems.
He also talks about Coto’s attempt to really make Enterprise into a prequel, but seems to dismiss his efforts as only appealing to the ‘hardcore’
Manny had a tremendous amount of excitement about the potential links between Enterprise and the first season of the original series, and he wanted to build those bridges, or at least create steps that would foreshadow some of the things that would happen in the original series. I think to the hardcore fans it was a terrific direction to go. On the other hand, the ratings continued to slip a bit. The problems that existed continued after the release of our final movie [Nemesis] did not help.
…and before he goes, one last jab at UPN for good measure
Looking back, the lack of support and the lack of interest people seemed to have in UPN didn’t help us, either. We were working on a network that, in a sense, was completely contradictory to the nature of the show. UPN had become a network of young women and girls and it was not a good marriage at that point.
This may be the last we hear from Mr. Berman. After overseeing the Trek franchise since the death of Gene Roddenberry in 1991 his tenure has come to an end. Berman’s contract with Paramount ends in about 2 weeks and Paramount have made it clear that he will not be involved in JJ Abrams Star Trek XI.
for more check out the latest issue of Star Trek Magazine (out in the UK, due in the US in a few weeks)
excerpts courtesey of SciFi Pulse
I certanly don’t agree with everything that Berman has done, but I think he deserves a great deal of credit for keeping the show alive and far more successful than Roddenberry was able to.
Thank you, Rick.
He sucks…..he ruined the franchise…..
He didnt keep the show alive he killed it by over saturating the market with Trek…and bad Trek at that. With a constant viewership decline since DS9 he did nothing to help out the franchise.
As I have stated before, Berman bashers ignore the many years he oversaw some great Trek (like the best years of TNG, DS9 and First Contact). But (especially in the last half of his tenure) mistakes were made, and he does seem to have difficulty acknowledging them.
Berman was a company man. He tried HIS best, but he was not the right person for the overall job of running the franchise. Starting with Star Trek: Generations, the house of cards began to fall. Voyager was serviceable, but perfunctory in its evolved TNG style and Enterprise was a flawed concept that did well in many respects, but was too little, too late at that point. At its height, you could have played Star Trek on the Lifetime network and fans would have shown up. And Nemesis’ failure was his fault. Berman’s excusess are pure rubbish.
With all the cheerful warmth of the holiday spirit, let me be the first to say f-you Rick Berman, you talentless hack. Your impostor versions of Star Trek have become as reviled flash in the pan failures as you are. Try as you and your lackeys might to turn Star Trek into a technobabel filled, asexual, neutered, socialist left wing, self important new age spiritual, dispassionate, zeolously politically correct, bland alagory, you have failed. Star Trek, the real Star Trek lives, it lives on this site each day, on xbox where a whole new generation of hollywood’s prime target audience has discovered how groovy Kirk and Spock are, it lives on the pages of Variety where even the tiniest piece of info on the new movie cause a stir across the web, it lives in the hearts of Exeter Studio who produced a superior product in their garage, It lives in Mr. William Shatner who has become an icon in hollywood (who you wanted to make the chef and couldn’t find the money to pay), it lives on aintitcool.com where Original Star Trek is as hot a topic of discussion as Lord of the Rings or Star Wars, it lives in the heart of Manny Coto who was given a load of your crap and asked to turn it to gold and despite the challange produced the only watchable episodes of your failed series, it lives in the heart of a hollywood superheavyweight and true fan of the original vision of Star Trek: Mr. J.J. Abrams, most importantly it lives in our hearts despite your attempts to prostitute and completely deviate from what we have always held dear. The legend of Kirk and Spock lives, 40 years later and grows each day. Rick Berman you piece of shat (heh heh) a-hole.
The excerpts from the interview with Rick Berman shows precisely why Star Trek fans turned on him. During his tenure with the 24th century shows, his overall ignorance of the Star Trek zeitgeist may not have been so important, but it was vital to whether or not Enterprise would have succeeded.
You don’t have to be obsessive about the original series, but if you are making a show set in that reality you must be BEHOLDEN to it. You can’t just discard things or make up new things that contradict what viewers already know about the Star Trek universe just because it suits you to do so. I don’t think Berman hated TOS, but he certainly didn’t seem to have a great deal of respect for it, and that as much as anything else, ultimately damned Enterprise.
Oh, that and he refused to even have the Star Trek banner in the Enterprise title banner at first. That was a bonehead move, pure and simple.
His backhanded compliment to Manny Coto is just another example of hius lack of respect. Coto tried his best to make Enterprise a real Star Trek show, and he should be lauded for that. The fact that ratings continued to slip isn’t Coto’s fault, it’s Berman’s for forcing 3 years of tenuous continuity into a timeline where it didn’t fit. That forced viwers away, and Coto’s attempt to fix things was too short lived for fans to find their way back. I honestly believe that had Enterprise been able to continue for another two years, Coto would have turned Enterprise into a show that Trek fans would have accepted and embraced again.
Perhaps now that Berman isn’t Trek’s gatekeeper any longer, he’ll find the time to watch TOS. Maybe he’ll gain some respect for what Roddenberry and the TOS cast and crew accomplished and remember why the show has millions of true, die hard fans who can watch episodes of a 40 year old TV show with new eyes each time. Maybe he’ll see what he got right and where he went wrong and he’ll learn something about what Trek really is.
Berman made some of the best Trek out there, but he also had a hand in nearly killing it. Hopefully time will give him some perspective on that.
Michael Piller, Ron Moore, Ira Steven Behr, and Manny Coto carried the water for Rick Berman. Don’t any of you fool yourself otherwise.
I really debated if I should even post this, but as I said this is his last interview as an employee of Paramount so it is a bit of an occasion. i know that bashing berman and namecalling him is up there with nitpicking as a favorite Trekkie passtime. But try and show the world that TrekMovie.com isn’t your typical Star Trek site.
critques are ok…but maybe a little restraint and perhaps some eloquence
just like I dont like to see personal flaming of other members, I dont like to see the type of vitriol in the number 5 post
so tone it down people
#8 Anthony
You’re right. I think a lot of us are emotional because we feel betrayed by Berman’s mishandling of the franchise. Was he 100% bad? Absolutely not, he knew to hire some good people during many years in his position. I personally never understood his fascination with multiple Data’s (he personally scripted “Brothers” which was a Brent Spiner-festival, and of couse, who can forget the oh so cleverly named B-4 in Nemesis!), but he was not some Satan-spawn launched to kill Star Trek. Left to his own devices, without Piller, Moore, and Behr, he made mistakes. Coto had a vision for Enterprise but at that point, Viacom had made their mind up that the series was a dud and the run would soon end.
I cannot fake kindness when it comes to Berman. He turned me against the show I loved for most of my life. I am extremely gratified that he is no longer associated with Star Trek.
Bye Rick. Thanks for nothing. And I mean that literally. Don’t let the door hit you in the arse on the way out.
I think UPN does/did deserve a HUGE amount of the blame!
I’m glad everyone knows it, I’m also glad Berman was very candid in saying he was proud of it but recognized the mistakes.
I will always be a big Berman fan. I enjoyed the final season of Enterprise, I LOVE TNG, but didn’t watch Voyager or DS9. I’ve appreciated SOME of DS9 in later years but still despise Voyager. The point being, that I like many stopped watching for a very long time once TNG stopped, even under Berman’s administration. But if you’ve ever watched an interview, I just think he’s an absolutely wholehearted, genuine, truthful person. I really appreciate his work on TNG and some of the TNG movies. I don’t blame him for Treks downfall though. He always worked his hardest when it was right or wrong. Complain about Braga if you want, I think he garnered too much power too fast — though I could be wrong — and didn’t have adequate respect for that which came before him. But I loathe seeing a man as genuine as Berman get this disrespect, not to mention hateful disrespect. He may no longer be the best man for the job and it’s one thing to call him on it. But to put forward this hateful speech as if he’s some dark demonic force, is arrogant, rude, disrespectful and completely unfair.
I appreciate this interview. I have appreciated him. I hope he can find prestige writing somewhere else.
He sucks…plain and simple.
Berman wanted William Shatner as a Chef?
This is my first post here…I ask that you don’t flame me. I am simply stating an opinion.
I have watched TOS probably close to 50 times each episode..spanning my life as a small child to now an adult. The show was the best Trek by far in terms of stories…at least Seasons 1 & 2 were. Freiberger’s horrible production did a wonderful job in killing the series after NBC forced it to 10pm Friday nights (forcing a stubborn and hurt Roddenberry to leave production) when all its fans were out partying. I wonder if Freigberger caught this kind of wrath in 1970? It wasn’t all his fault..NBC cut the budget in half too.
Anyway, I’ve watched all Trek since. TAS was excellent. TNG was good..some episodes were very good. Not as good as TOS but still, good. I missed Kirk…Data was a poor imitiation of Spock. Nevertheless, I took it for it was…a brand new show with new characters. I enjoyed it. DS9 was ok…moving Trek onto a stationary space station was kind of boring for me. The show ended strong however with the Dominion War. Entertaining in the end. Voyager to me was my favortie after TOS. Janeway was the most like Kirk that I had seen. Enterprise was actually very good in my opinion and I fail to see why everyone hates it. I was very sad when it was cancelled..the show was really starting to pick up. They did quite a good job in connecting the dots in the pre-Kirk era…especially int he last season. Did fans hate it because it was a prequel? If so, what is going to happen when another director (one famous for spy films and shows of all things) tries to actually recast Kirk and Spock..the most beloved characters on Trek ever?
My point is this…to those of you who seem to hate Berman and are thrilled at the idea of a new director…I feel you’re in for a major disappointment. Berman made some good shows..entertaining shows at that. Not all were good, but let’s face it…not all of TOS were good either. We laugh at Spock’s Brain all the time. Do you honestly believe there’s a Berman show out there worse than Spock’s Brain? If so, not by much. And Berman made a TON of shows…hundreds.
I feel we should give Berman a break..without him, there would be no debate of what’s good Trek and what isn’t. The franchise is not dead..he did not kill it. He simply was not good at making a movie. His TV shows were fine. It will be fine when the next movie comes out. But I have a bad feeling everyone who thinks Abrams is going to “save the franchise” by bringing back Kirk and Spock is (as McCoy would say) “in for one heill of disappointment.”
Stop expecting perfection…stop expecting TOS to show up on your TV again..or in the theaters again. It just won’t happen. Take the new shows and movies for that they are…brand new shows based on an old show.
That is all. I now return you to what is sure to be another jab at Berman and Braga. Have a great holiday everyone.
I think that photograph of him says more than anything we could ::chuckles::
Bye Bye Ricky boy, don’t let the airlock hit ya where the good Lord split ya fella.
Com’on Man (head shaking) It seems that it’s on this Trek site as well, do you guys that say “Berman Sucks” and “Berman ruined Trek” really think that he had the final word on Trek? Uhh! no! Paramount has alot to blame with what happened to Trek. Starting in 93-94 with Generations, DS9, and Voyager in the same year. You can only suck so much on the teet! Except for the money and challenge I would never want Bermans job.
No matter what happens in the future Paramount will always make money on Star Trek. The same people who bitch and nitpick about “canon” will always be there to watch and fork over the cash for “limited edition” Star Trek crap.
What happens if Abrams screws up his movie? They will try, try, and try……and try some more…….
It’s funny when some of you whine and cry like little girls with a skinned knee, please keep it up……. Thanks!!!
Darth “Craptasitc” Ballz
Why the knock on Manny Coto?
It sounds like he blamed him for the slip in ratings in the fourth season … but wouldn’t that be the natural extension of a three season slippery slope of ratings that led into it?
If Manny Coto had been involved on an exec level from day one, I think “Enterprise” would have been far better and more than likely more successful. He understood the potential of a prequel series and tried to make it be that. He didn’t try to shoehorn a bunch of TNG-type plot devices (ie, Temporal Cold War) in to make it “better.”
Manny Coto has moved on to great success, co-producing the popular show “24” which won a slew of Emmys (including best drama) for last season’s work. I guess you could guess Coto is not losing much sleep over anything Berman has to say about his tenure on Enterprise.
…Berman’s problem is that he fell prey to his own ego and refused to acknowledge that any decisions he and Braga made could possibly be the wrong ones. He started off on the wrong foot with Enterprise by insisting on using that Rod Stewart lame-assed “Faith of the Heart” as the show’s theme song despite almost unanimous agreement amongst viewers that it killed each episode’s momentum from the first note. The song was so despised that most episode cappers removed the opening credits from all their uploaded copies save for the Mirror Universe 2-parter as a public service. And from there, he simply allowed the franchise to go downhill. Had he had 1/3 the balls of either Michael Pillar or Ron Moore, he’d have fought harder to get the show more support from the network, rather than just pissing along trying to keep his job.
So, as someone else posted, don’t let the airlock hit your ass on the way out, Rick. After all, the Alien Queen is waiting for you out there, and she’s probably pretty hungry too…
re #5
Man that’s a lot of hate… You would have preferred Trek became an all natural, oversexed, fascist right wing, un-important, hackneyed, passionately soulless, politically ambiguous allegory?
Seriously, I can respect people’s opinions…, I personally couldn’t stand the last 2 Star Trek movies or Enterprise. I’m not sure however, that you can look at an entire body of work, consisting of 6 – 700 hundred hours of TV & movies, and say it all sucked.
That shows a lack of critical judgement man. Your choice of a deragatory screen name is enough to render your comments largely irrelevant to me.
Doug
I think Berman has some rights in saying that the last part of the fourth season of Enterprise was good “only for the hardcore”. I wouldn’t be so drastic, but I stopped watching it after the Vulcan arc, since the ties with TOS (a series I never liked that much) became too much for me. It seemed to me that Enterprise needed a ton of ToS references to be recognized, and I don’t agree with that. THat, and a few other stuff thrown in (like the -IMO- worst idea for DS9, Section 31 “prequel”) made me stop watching the show. And I don’t agree with all the bashing. YOu can criticize Berman’s *work*, but not going to personal insults. For me, it produced entertaining television with ups and downs, and that’s all that matters to me.
#5 Wow. Really really lame, dude.
#8 Hear, hear. I’m appreciating this site more and more for the quality of the discussion, and I’m realizing it has everything to do with keeping a damper on hate-filled rants.
#21 Agreed. Some here are claiming that Coto’s work was better in season 4 but ratings still went down only because it was “natural” after 3 seasons of dwindling ratings.
But if season 4 really did have greater widespread appeal wouldn’t the show at least have held on to the viewers it still had at the beginning of the season? Truth is, season 4 was only better in that it appealed to continuity buffs. In terms of pure storytelling there really wasn’t much improvement.
I’ll lose no sleep over his departure. Out of literally hundreds of hours of Bermanized Trek there are only a handful of episodes that I would ever care to lay eyes on again. Yes, I watched every stinking hour of Berman Trek, because once in a blue moon they would crank out an “Inner Light” or “Yesterday’s Enterprise”…or “The Visitor.” And everytime I would say to myself…well….someone “gets it”, maybe things will turn around. Sadly it was usually episode after episode after episode of technobabble- ridden, last minute solutions with plodding a/b storylines and lackluster characterizations. Once in a while, the glimmer of TOS would come through, but sadly, it was the exception rather than the rule. I haven’t watched, nor have I had any desire to return to any of the Trek TV spin-offs after they aired their last episode. TOS dvd’s and movies sustain me when I need a Trek fix every couple of months. I can watch them over and over while Trek, after Berman, holds no interest for me at all. I’m grateful that Trek Remastered has given me yet one more opportunity to see my favorite episodes in a new light. And the new movie is very exciting. Yes. Berman helped his version of Trek prosper, be he also was resistant to change and content to let the universe stagnate, and that, in my opinion, was his downfall.
#22:
I wouldn’t say all the problems that are said to plague Enterprise were the cause of its downfall. There are a number of factors, usually people tend to emphasize the ones that stood out more for them. For me, it simply didn’t go well (I tend to consider the series as separate entities rather than a full going story divided in several branches). I think I’m one of the few that enjoyed the TCW arc, and was rather disappointed to see the hasty conclusion of Storm Front. I think it’ll pass a long time before someone can look and evaluate Berman’s performance on an objective level.
I think his time is done with end of Enterprise, but that doesn’t mean I’ll be happy if he’s not involved. I’m curious to see what JJ Abrams will bring to Star Trek, though one of his creations (Lost) is the kind of show I hate most. That, and the TOS era which I’m not very fond of, but I can overlook and see what the movie will be without prejudices anyway.
William Shatner as a Chef on Enterprise? Someone help
Rick Berman deserves nothing but scorn and hate from the fan. He didn’t keep the franchise alive. He took the goose that laid the golden eggs and cooked it.
Even to this date, the idiot hasn’t watched the series that gave him a job. No wonder the franchise failed under his leadership.
The best thing about Rick Berman was his exit.
Let’s hope Abrams is competent and brings in Shatner and Nimoy to reverse Generations. That’s step 1.
There is not ONE person to “blame” for this. Whether anyone likes it or not the FACT is that Star Trek went downhill based on STATS alone. The ratings reflected the group sentiment – but wait a minute!!!! Thats what happened in TOS in the beginning too! It wasn’t till some time passed that new watchers came on board and the snowball continued. DS9 for the first 3 seasons – until Worf came in was lame CA-RAPP. The worst Star Trek ever. Voyager was more faithful to the IDEA of TOS hence Janeway and Kirk are the most similar Captains. Try watching these Berman/Bragga/Coto/Ryan episodes again many years after you first saw them. Berman did an OK job sometimes. Roddenberry made mistakes too. When he gave up the reins for TOS’s 3rd season there were still some really good ones (Enterprise Incident for example) First 2 seasons of TNG were a bit lame here and there. Some great Star Trek was produced by Berman, as was some great STar Trek produced by Roddenberry. Both didn’t score 100% Keep it in context. Really Die hard fans are way too fanatical and are too wrapped up in the “world” of Star Trek to be able to step back and look at what was helmed by Berman, and look at it from an ENTERTAINMENT point of view. I personally think Jeri Ryan did a wonderful job. Star Trek got very meaningful when she came on board. Voyager was a masterpiece, and the last 2 or 3 seasons od DS9 got good for what the show was – a TAKE on Star Trek. (Sisko was still a dope of a Captain.)
Sorry Jeri Taylor. (Got 7 of 9 on the brain)
re 27
I think the worst Trek seasons ever (excluding all of Enterprise) were Season 1 of TNG & Season 1 of DS9. After that though they both steadily improved.
I still think DS9 brought the most involved relationships and storylines to the Trek Universe, and it was damn near brilliant until about season 6. Hit or miss after that. Terrible series finale.
Doug
#24 Yeah, it will be interesting to see what Abrams winds up doing. Incidentally, with all the criticism Berman’s taken for not watching every episode of TOS, has Abrams ever claimed to watch every one? I know he’s said he didn’t pay too much attention to the later series. It might be too much to expect him to be a Trek super-expert.
Good for Rick Berman; the guy’s responsible for most of modern “Star Trek,” good *and* bad.
I enjoyed Manny Coto’s version of “Enterprise,” but there’s not much question that his references to TOS were of interest mainly to hard core fans. How could it be otherwise?
And no, there’s no reason for *anyone* to watch all of TOS unless they really really like it. Much of it is close to unbearable, and there’s nothing so instructive for continuity reasons about knowing what the name for the slaves in “The Cloud Minders” was (for example) that the exercise can be justified on those grounds.
Go ahead. Get it all out of your system. All that hate for TNG, Picard, “the left”, etc.
Hate coming from (purported) Star Trek fans. This marvelous new era of hate-mongering and fear-mongering really has left no stone unturned.
I suggest to Paramount, “there is your new audience…” It’s a large one, should be quite profitable for you.
Sorry but I can’t sit through an episode of TOS without laughing and talking about how shit it all was, their movies (for the most part) were good and their movies are what saved the entire TOS.
Oh another thing Enterprise was great all the way through (it’s my 2nd fave after TNG) TNG was consistantly excellent after season two and an above average show that produced 3 excellent films (FUCK U BAIRD) DS9 was also a very different take on the entire universe of Trek however it was excellent once it hit it’s stride and Voyager was just plain dumb and unintelligent all the way through and TOS reminds me of the Batman film of the 60’s.
Opinions are just that… opinions. Personally, I’m not a totally exccentric Star Trek fan, I started liking it with TOS movies, was introduced to the series by my father and started loving it and since I begun watching TNG I got married to it. And never let it go, I love all versions of Star Trek, even the FlashGordon-like animated series (and I hope for another animated series), and Enterprise, for me was really welcome. I think its overture was really adequate to the series proposal, and it has the best vulcan character since Spock, and I only watched the first season (for lack of time motives), considered the worst for many “fans”. So I’m sure I gonna really enjoy the other three and be sorry for its descontinuity. But I’m sure that Star Trek is very strong universe that can never be ruined by one person, and it never was, for it had its ups and downs since the very beginning, by the hands of the Great Bird.
Al- Purportedly his and his people’s idea of bringing Shatner back on Enterprise was to make him some sort of comic relief character on Enterprise, the chef. Yes it’s true. Then when fans pooped on that idea he balked at paying Shatner for an appearance saying it wouldn’t help ratings. Maybe it wouldn’t have but it didn’t stop him from preparing a teaser trailer to show to advertisiers highlighting the retun of Kirk and it would have made alot of us happy to have our Captain back.
#20 Doug i am not a right winger I am a moderate. I am sick to death of the Left and the Right highjacking the agenda. TOS was very moderate in it’s tone because it was created and written by men who had fought in and seen both the horrors and neccessities of war (we’re talking WWII here not Vietnam or Iraq so settle down) They had the turbilance of not only WWII, but the cold war and the social upheaval of the 60’s to draw upon, they lived in very thrilling and perilous times. The Next Generation Era was mostly extremely Socially Liberal , like some sort of Northern California new age comune where they had preschools and social workers making command desicions on the flag battleships of the fleet. Deep Space Nine, a wonderful show, was also very moderate in it’s tone. The best of the Next Generation (First Contact , Best Of Both Worlds, Yesterday’s Enterprise) had more in common tonally with TOS than the rest of the Next Gen Era. And what is wrong with sexuallity?? Did i say I wanted an oversexed Star Trek?? I want a Star Trek that doesn’t seem afraid of it. The TOS wasn’t afraid of it, Ron Moore’s Battlestar Galactica isn’t afraid of it, Deep Space Nine and Babylon 5 weren’t afraid of it. But the whole Next Generation era was., especially Voyager. The characters are all so repressed (except for Riker I suppose) . The greatest shame of it all is that Patrick Stewart did the swashbuckler so well when they let him. Go back and watch his scenes in Dune and especially Excalabur when he single handedly holds off a fort with a blood covered battleax while protecting his daughter Guiniveere. A little bit more of that and a little less flute playing would have been nice. I loath what Rick Berman tried to steer Star Trek into and I will not apologize for it and i loath him for his cavalier attidute to even the smallest requests of the fans (like not changing the dumb ass song on Enterprise) or bashing Manny Coto who is a major player in hollywood and is a fan of the original vision of Star Trek just like most of us.
Backtracking to #14, David, I think that was a fair and even-handed assessment of Bermans contirbution. Your mention of Fred Freiberger also made me chuckle, reminding me that, were he alive today, Freiberger would be Berman’s biggest fan — for replacing him as Star Trek’s most reviled producer — the “Man Who Killed Star Trek” — again!
Berman was forced by the studio to produce two further trek series together. So it was not really his fault or idea at this point. But I agrees with Anthony that later mistakes were made that at least should be ackknowledged today. Berman has nothing to loose.
Well, he’s right. Berman can’t hate something, unless he’s actually watched it and made an opinion of it. I think he’s just not interested in the original series. And maybe that’s worse than hating it, for Star Trek writer and producer, I mean.
Hi, folks. First post from me. As a long-time fan of Trek (since the early 1990s — long time for me, being only 23) and being someone who has seen pretty much every hour of Trek (from TOS to the movies to the TNG-era shows to Enterprise), I just wanted to express my intense disappointment at the extreme ignorance and immaturity conveyed by pseudo-fans such as the writer of message #5. Yes, Berman has made several mistakes during his tenure as overseer of the franchise; but then again, so has many others involved in the productions. Everyone keeps saying how he “killed” the franchise, yet they fail to realize that the damn thing had been running for 18 years straight. Mistakes were bound to creep up, and fatigue was bound to set in after some time.
Now, do I agree with everything Berman does and says? No, of course not. The ratings for Enterprise’s fourth season did not continue to slip because it began targeting only hardcore fans, it slipped because A.) the first three seasons had already had slipping ratings, and B.) the show had been moved to Friday nights (big mistake in the TV world, as evidenced by the third season of the original season). And why were the ratings slipping to begin with? Well, let’s face it: the early seasons of Enterprise – specifically season 2 – did not offer many great moments. Episodes such as “Marauders”, “The Communicator”, “The Crossing”, “Horizon”, and “Bounty” were less-than-memorable, while some like “Vanishing Point” and “A Night in Sickbay” were just plain horrible. But one thing people must understand is that all TV shows (yes, Star Trek is a TV show, remember?) have their bad moments, and Enterprise was no different. Add to that the fact that Berman spent 18 years writing for Trek, so naturally it becomes more and more difficult to write material which the viewers have not only never seen before, but which they will also find engaging.
Many people will point out that one reason why Enterprise failed was because it did not stick to Trek canon and as such supposedly disrespected the original series. You must realize that anyone who tuned out from Enterprise for this reason are, for lack of a better term, idiots. These are people who are far too involved in the world of Trek, yet lack sufficient imagination to “fill in the gaps”, as it were. Here’s an idea: how about instead of whining and crying and demanding to be spoon-fed your stories and your canon, you instead use your mind (you do remember how to use that, right?) to think up possible explanations for apparent continuity errors? Star Trek is smart television for smart people, and if you can’t show an ounce of intelligence when watching it, then perhaps you shouldn’t.
Also, why is Enterprise getting such a bad wrap for its inconsistencies with Trek canon? Nearly every episode or film contradicts SOMETHING from other episodes of films; TOS and Voyager did this constantly. Yes Enterprise is the guilty party? No, I don’t think so. Let’s face it, anyone who rambles on about how Enterprise violated Trek canon apparently never watched the other shows and obviously has no idea what the hell they’re talking about.
Basically, what this rant comes down to is: stop bitching. You don’t like Berman? That’s fine, but don’t sit there and swear at the man as if A.) Trek is dead and he is the cause; B.) he is the only one at fault for Trek’s current “hiatus”; and C.) as if you could do any better, because unless you’re an expert television writer, we all know you’re lying. Giving your opinion is one thing, but thrashing the man is another.
Okay, I’m done now. I’ll let those Berman-haters who completely disagree with me to further prove my point by continuing to bash Mr. Berman. Have fun!
#33 and 34
I had some choice comments for you, but in the interest of interstellar peace, let’s just say…I disagree with you.
farewell rick berman
live long and prosper
Honestly, I lost interest in Trek when they killed Kirk, and essentially TOS, so I’m thrilled that Berman is no longer involved as opposed to someone that will come onboard and show the TOS characters the respect they deserve. I never got into the newer Treks, and maybe Berman is the reason, but I felt the new stuff lacked the magic and spark of the original. I watched TNG for a few years before just giving up. FC was pretty good, but that’s the last new Trek I’ve seen.
Hindsight is a wondeful thing. We can step back and look at things we could
have done differently. There was agreat deal wrong with “Enterprise” that
could have been corrected early on it was not. Potential is a terrible thing
to waste. More than enough effort was produced to let Berman and Braga
know that the direction the show was taking was wrong and all this imput
was ignored. Its too bad Coto wasn’t there at the start of season 2 the show
would probably still be on. Berman and Braga did produce some really fine
“Trek” but the path they chose for the series caused it to fail big time. The
viewers left in droves and Sponge Bob Squarepants kicked enterprises ass
for the time slot what does that tell you. “Star Trek:Enterprise” could have
been glorious and instead we’re left with stories untold.
Wow, the “Berman Bashing Brigade” is still alive and well! LOL Though I do not like the man, I think in some cases he’s treated too harshly. One case, however, where he deserves what he gets is his “treatment” of TOS. As someone else mentioned, how in blazes does he think he can do a Star Trek prequel series without watching every single minute of TOS (movies included)??? Watching them all even just once would not be enough. It’s called researching a project and getting prepared to do it justice.
I truly think by the time they were developing “Enterprise”, they were just sitting there saying to themselves, “hmm…now what will we do?” “Hey, Star Wars prequels make a lot of money. let’s do a prequel. Then we can do whatever we want to, since it’s in the past.” As they sit in the producers room, they continue, “Oh man, what are we gonna do about those fans who scream that Star Trek should look to the future?” “Hey, I got it, Rick!!! Let’s put some time travel aspects into this story…make a mystery character that shows us glimpses into the future so we can satisfy those whiner fans. Heck, we can do anything we want to that way! ”
It all just keeps going downhill from there. Though Manny Coto was far from perfect, had he come on DURING season one and been given the general directional control of the show, I think it would still be on or grinding down to it’s 7 year halt time. The ratings?? Nah, wouldn’t be great, but would be LOTS better than where they ended up. Voyager pretty much helped to seal Enterprises ratings, to a certain degree.
Even silly minor things that Berman and Braga did to annoy fans. It should be spoken, Captain Jonothan Archer or THE Enterprise…not Captain Jonothan Archer of Enterprise. Maybe it sounds silly, but why the heck do they think they are so mighty that they try to correct grammar from a 1960’s classic! Insane!!!!! And there is so much more that they did that was like that…
Rant over! I think…
…not quite! I think Star Trek actually started to decline when they destroyed the original starship Enterprise. The ultimate shock value back then, the ace up the sleeve regarding Captain Kirk. They blew it wayyyyy too soon. I loved Star Trek 4, but it felt weird without the ol’ girl! It’s felt weird ever since!!
Despite the fact I enjoyed Voyager Berman and UPN drop the ball on it. I hated the fact that they drfted away from their premise when that is why some many fans (not all) turned into Voyager then he abandoned what people wanted to see? With Enterprise you kind of had to bear with it but it did have a good premise and character that was easy to like. Manny C was doing a great job with the show but it was to late. Enterprise would probably be on if it was on a different network like Sci-Fi, G4 or Spike TV.
I thought that Manny Coto was hired onto Enterprise during the third season because of his work with Odyssey 5, which had a similar premise. The way I see it, if the series never went in the Xindi storyline direction, then Manny would never have been hired for the job. And the fourth season (as we know it) would never have happened.
I’m one of those people that is still wanting to see Enterprise come back, but I’m not holding my breath. Most of those that had worked on it have moved on to other things. But … I believe Manny Coto did say that he’d drop whatever he’s doing if he ever got a chance to work on Star Trek again.
That’s what I get for typing too fast and proofing too fast. In #45 I meant to say: There were even silly minor things that Berman and Braga did to annoy fans. When talking about the starship, it should be spoken, “Captain Jonothan Archer of THE Enterprise…not Captain Jonothan Archer of Enterprise.”
I think that Berman tried as hard as he could to make latter Trek work, but the problem is that he couldn’t see outside of the rigid box that was built in the TNG days. Enterprise just had the same stale limitations as Voyager and DS9 — same bland dialog, same tired incidental music, same photographic style, and essentially the same safe characters with just different names.
No, Trek needs to move completely outside that 1980s box and employ modern dialog, quirky characters that act like they’re in the real world, and face strong, fresh science fiction stories that don’t depend on Klingons. Oh, and modern shooting styles too. I’m not suggesting they change the message or history of Star Trek, but they certainly need to take Battlestar Galactica’s lead in terms of character approach, adult stories and modern photography. Yeah, and please don’t spoil the freshness by bringing in that campy, greedy has-been called Shatner. That would be a step backwards.