Two weeks ago, ViacomCBS made the surprise announcement that they had bought back the international streaming rights to Star Trek: Discovery from Netflix, which prompted a backlash among international fans. Now the company’s CEO is talking about the reasoning behind the decision—along with talking up season four.
CEO: Star Trek is “working” for Paramount+
Earlier today, ViacomCBS CEO Bob Bakish spoke about the future of the media corporation at the UBS Global TMT Virtual Conference. One of the questions asked by UBS analyst and moderator John Hodulik regarded the trend for ViacomCBS licensing to third parties. Bakish noted that the company continues to bring in revenue for many deals cut before the launch of Paramount+, but priorities have since changed, which includes Star Trek:
As we increasingly transition to leveraging our particular franchises and original production for our owned and operated streaming assets, principally Paramount+… that, in turn, will create a decline in that third-party business over time as these deals roll off. I would note that as an example of that, we just took back Star Trek: Discovery internationally from Netflix. And so we now have that property globally. That’s clearly a core franchise for us, and it’s working.
Following the November removal of Discovery from Netflix, ViacomCBS launched the fourth season on Paramount+ in Latin America, the Nordic countries, and Australia. It also made the show available via the Pluto TV free live streaming service in Europe as part of the “transition” while awaiting the launch of Paramount+ in Europe in early 2022. Today, ViacomCBS also announced a deal to launch Paramount+ in South Korea in 2022, which will be the first Asian launch for the streaming service. And during the UBS panel, Bakish indicated there are plans for more Paramount+ launches in Asia being planned.
The CEO’s warning to investors about third-party licensing revenue declining is another sign that ViacomCBS is serious about keeping their assets on Paramount+. He told the UBS conference, “We’re on a path where you will see us increasingly maximize our franchises for our owned and operated benefit.” In addition to buying back the Discovery international rights from Netflix, we have also seen how ViacomCBS is letting other licensing deals lapse as they “roll off,” resulting in three Star Trek series leaving Netflix in the USA back in September.
Wilson Cruz as Culber and Anthony Rapp as Stamets in Discovery season 4 publicity photo
Discovery Season 4 has CEO “feeling good”
Bakish also talked up the latest season of Discovery, which premiered on November 18:
We just launched season four… and it’s off to the fastest start in terms of subscribers than all of the Discovery series seasons to date. So we’re feeling good about that.
Bakish revealed that Paramount+ had its best week ever and best month ever in November. However, Discovery has yet to be confirmed for a fifth season. Traditionally, Paramount+ (previously CBS All Access) has announced additional season pickups around the time of the launch of a new season, as they did recently for Star Trek: Prodigy.
Find more Star Trek Universe news and analysis at TrekMovie.com.
I wasn’t the only one watching CNBC this morning…..
I hope it gets 8 seasons just to annoy the gatekeepers. Cause that’s one more season than any other Trek show. Yes theyre only half as long but still. ALSO i’m glad in a way that it’s not on Netflix anymore as it might stop gatekeepers continually watching it every week “just to make sure it still sucks”. If they have to get P+ exclusively for trek theres less chance and only actual fans will be watching.
Maybe, but it may just encourage people to pirate it. Folks in some countries may love paying money out endlessly on every media company, studio and their pet dog who wants their own streaming service, but that model doesn’t work everywhere. Cutting the cord has been a big thing in the US where companies were charging a lot for their TV services, but it’s not the same worldwide. Prime and Netflix in my country work because they aggregate content from various sources for one fee. Sometimes they are bundled free with certain cable/satellite subscriptions, which are generally much better value to begin with. The more money we have to pay to increasing numbers of separate individual services, the more the overall costs rise and people will look for other solutions. It’s got nothing to do with being an ‘actual fan’, it’s just people don’t want to be taken for fools and pay five or six streaming services for the same amount of content they used to pay to just one or two services.
Cutting the cord is proving to be just as expensive as paying for cable.
Of course, media companies want to make up for the missing income from cable bills. They may be cutting out the middle man but somebody still has to pay for that content.
Cutting the cord only gets expensive if one feels they need to sub every channel under the sun, just like folks who pay for ‘maxed out’ cable. The good thing is that this way, you at least get the entirety of what that network offers, both moviewise and on TV and you still manage to get more channels for less. I pay 65 for 1 Gb fiber, sub Netflix, P+ w/o ads, Hulu/Disney+ w/o ads, HBO Max w/o ads, Peacock w/ ads and DIRECTV Stream (as live TV + login to all the networks channels) and it still costs less than I used to pay for mid tier cable that got me only some of the channels I wanted. I’m getting all the channels my family wants now.
The devil is also in the details. Many cable providers also add these taxes that are unheard of. Comcast adds a TV tax that’s almost $10 monthly on top of other taxes and if you want unlimited data you’ll need to either rent their modem or pay $30 on top of whatever is paid for internet.
Well… I can’t get the channels I wand through streaming. Streaming only remains a bad option. Especially since for every service except Netflix I am forced to cast from my phone. Which is a major drawback.
Honestly, if you’re willing to wait a bit to watch everything all at once, cutting the cord can be very cost effective. Basically, you sign up for one or two services each month and just rotate through them. Want to watch the newest Marvel show on Disney+, wait for the season to finish airing, subscribe for a month, and binge it. Want to watch the newest season of For All Mankind on AppleTV+, do the same thing, wait for the season to air and then subscribe for a month and binge.
Better yet, while certainly frowned upon (and maybe, technically illegal?), spread the subscriptions across family and friends and share credentials. That’s what I do. I pay for Netflix and have an Amazon Prime account (so Prime Video is included), another friend pays for Paramount+, my sister has Disney+ and Hulu, my parents have HBO Max, etc.
I don’t know why anyone would subscribe to multiple services at once though… how much time do you have to watch all that content?!
The point I’d have thought is you can chop and change services from month to month depending what takes your fancy throughout various times of the year.
I guess it’s for two reasons: 1) many people are too lazy to cancel and reactivate their subscriptions over and over, and 2) people are spoilt and want to have all the options all the time, even though it’s much more than they could ever actually watch. If you’re cycling through services it means you may have to wait to watch something on another service that you’re currently not subscribed to. I can definitely relate to the first point. I’m only subscribed to Netflix (outside the US) but I’ve kept the service for years now even though there have been periods when I only watched maybe 1 or 2 hours in a whole month. Basically, people are paying more for added convenience. They could pay less but it would take more effort or cause inconvenience in the sense that you cannot watch whatever you want whenever you want.
Since I’m not even taking full advantage of that one streaming service I find that for myself it doesn’t make sense to subscribe to a bunch of other services even though there might be individual shows on them that I’d be interested in. I will probably subscribe to Paramount Plus when it becomes available here but I’ll have to see if there’s more than just Star Trek on there to keep me subscribed.
I just torrented it to confirm it still sucks, can confirm, it still sucks, don’t hold much hope for S2 of Picard either.
Thanks Lukas, I was holding my breath for your qualitative denouement.
More content is always a good thing, even if it “sucks”, I wish star trek fans were more supportive DURING a shows run or a movie release. Instead they trash it for 8-10 years until it becomes a “cult classic” and then complain they only got 3-7 seasons.
It doesn’t suck. It’s actually pretty great,
Lol that sums up Enterprise perfectly!
AND I STILL WANT A FIFTH SEASON! 😠
Enterprise is an interesting case study as it really didn’t find its stride until Season 4 (though I have a soft spot for Season 3), just in time for it to be canceled. I think if TPTB gave Enterprise a 5th season, it could’ve really taken off, and more seasons would have followed.
Alas, we were left with “These are the Voyages…” by far the worst valentine’s gift in the history of valentine’s gifts.
I used to be the same way. But after watching it again some time ago, I actually really enjoyed the first two seasons (for the most part at least), while I found the fourth one a little too fanservicey … not really in a bad way (I am a fan after all) but it took away from the „NEW life and NEW Civilizations“ part 😅
with Voyager it was the other way around. I really liked it as a Teen and even later on, but now the show makes me kinda angry for all that wasted potential 😁
Yeah loved Enterprise from the second season on! I still like a lot of the episodes in the first season as well but it is my weakest.
Fans are backward. Guarantee that in 10-15 years a great many people will herald DSC as one of their favourite series and the herald of a new golden age in Trek. A proportion of Star Trek fans LOVE being miserable. I found a link to an old usenet forum or list going back to 1992 and you would not BELIEVE the amount of disdain, frustration and hate they were directing at TNG (just into it’s fifth season), the announcement of DS9 (so many wrote it off the moment it was announced much less aired) and even STVI: TUC, which I always thought was largely universally loved. Not so—at least not when it was released. Back then the fans were still disgruntled and dissatisfied with anything new. It was so eye opening. Gatekeeper fans love to suck the joy out of things.
P.S. I’m happy to say the new season of DSC has been pretty excellent so far, Lukas. Happy holidays.
This is so true, I can remember a lot of Trekkie friends of mine complaining when TNG came out, no Kirk, ugly Enterprise and that it was way too ‘PC’. A ship with carpet and counsellors who talked through their feelings – ugh! LOL. The only thing I’d say about negative ‘fandom’ online is that it is a bit distorted by the internet, most (real) fans will watch it, enjoy it and get on with their lives until the next episode. But people with an axe to grind love to go online and take the time to vent their woe and misery to anyone who will listen for as long as possible. I created and ran quite a large Sci-Fi and Fantasy group on Disqus which had about 125,000 followers, I always found that negatively biased discussions always attracted way more traction than positive ones. I even read some research about why that happens in online groups. It’s not just Star Trek, it’s everything, misery loves company.
I will agree with most of this as well. I have looked at Trekmovie’s past articles going back to 2008 and reading some of those threads you would think a lot of the shows, especially Voyager and Enterprise was created by Satan lol. People were SO bitter on a lot of these shows at the time and some even wanted to just wipe away the entire prime universe and just let those shows sink into oblivion because they thought it had become too convoluted and ‘real’ fans wanted something simpler again. It was also clear this site was populated by a lot of rabid TOS fans at that time (since the new movie was rebooting TOS) so the conversations were very biased as well. But I did sense a lot of people really wanted to wipe the slate clean and leave all the spin offs behind.
Cut to today and now these shows feel as iconic as ever. It doesn’t mean everyone loves them, but they are anything but forgotten today and even more popular now than when they were on, at least from DS9 through Enterprise. DS9 in itself, was actually well liked by a big segment of the fanbase, but was also considered the black sheep of the family by another large segment. Now it’s held as one of the best shows in the franchise if not the best. That show started out as my least favorite as well. It was my least favorite show through the first few years of Voyager. Today it’s my favorite show hands down and been that way for 20 years now. So yes, things can always change.
As for Discovery, in reality the show does have problems. That can’t be denied either. You don’t just randomly throw a show a thousand years into the future in its third season unless you’re trying to fix problems or just start over. In this case, its really both. But that said, Discovery didn’t really have anymore issues than most of the shows had in their early seasons. TNG is the most infamous for it. And then DS9, VOY and ENT all started off with a lot of issues as well, but they all ended being better shows in their last seasons too so things got better. In some of their cases MUCH better although YMMV.
I was very critical of Discovery early on. I still am today. But I also said the show still has the potential to be amazing and I support it 100%, it just needed some major changes which thankfully they recognized as well. And I didn’t want it to be another Enterprise, a show I DIDN’T support in the beginning and really regretted it today. I ended up loving that show once I gave it a real chance and liked all the changes they made to it in its third and especially fourth season. I don’t feel Discovery is anywhere as good as Enterprise was by its fourth season but its still very early. But I also feel it’s come a looooong way from it’s first season like all the other shows did in their first season. Again YMMV and I completely understand why many still don’t like it today. But I still think Discovery has the chance to just be as iconic as all the other shows. It just may take another 10-15 years lol.
So true! I remember when enterprise came out and everyone hated it except for myself. I seem to enjoy them all except ds9 which took me awhile to love and now is my favorite
Thanks Lucas I completely agree, I’m a life long trek fan and I didn’t even bother with Discovery’s latest episode which would of been unthinkable for me with any other Trek show.
I like Discovery even if I don’t always agree with some of the creative decisions, but Picard was difficult for me to watch. It didn’t reflect that sense of a more evolved and enlightened humanity that Roddenberry was trying to create with TNG, Picard himself looked like he needed a walking stick and a good rest. It felt forced – a show that didn’t need to be made, the TNG era should have been left as it was.
I had a lot of issues with Picard as well, but I didn’t have a problem with the show being darker at all. I know that is probably the biggest one for a lot of fans though and it certainly was talked about a lot here when the show was running.
I do love TNG because it did feel more enlightened and more progressive compared to TOS, but I never really watched the show for that either. I watched because I just love the stories and characters in general. Same for TOS as well. But I will also agree it probably was a mistake to make Picard feel more darker than that show and why it put fans off of it so soon. I also think that was probably what Stewart wanted himself to reflect the times people feel is happening in the real world today.
You do realize that railing against gatekeepers is itself a form of gatekeeping, yes?
That is most definitely not true. That’s like the people who say tolerant people need to tolerate the intolerant. Absolute lunacy.
Now you’re gatekeeping the definition of gatekeeping.
I’m a fan, even though a think Discovery is awful I’m going to keep watching. Is that gatekeeping? Hate watching? No idea, I don’t really keep up to date with termolgogy. So God help me I’m going to keep on watching. It’s my duty, it’s weird but that’s how I feel.
I hear you on this, Dvorak. And I’ve struggled with the same feeling. This is the first time I’ve given up on a Trek show. But I just can’t do it with DSC. With the exception of the Capt. Pike bits, literally can’t stand the show. Kudos to you, though (I think). Picard I had a much easier time getting through, even though in retrospect S1 wasn’t all that great.
I think that’s the right attitude Dvorak!
You think the show sucks but you still want to support it as a fan and hope it improves. I don’t think Discovery is still close to anything amazing but I do feel it has improved. I really do. I don’t know if I’m in the minority or not but all I can say is I enjoy it more today. I really started to like it by its second season, but I think a lot of people did thanks to bringing in Pike and the story line was interesting…at least in the beginning.
I’m the opposite. I actually quite enjoyed the first season. It had massive problems, everybody knows what they were, but it was a semi success in my book. Not in my top 10 or anything but mildly enjoyable. Second season was ok… but 3rd season was all downhill for me. And i’m not feeling the fourth season so far. Maybe it’ll improve. No idea.
I gave up early on in S2 I think.. it’s not for me. I can only possibly think its the characters don’t really excite me. I’m not entirely sure I like Burnham as the central focus of the show either. I think it’s a shame the show has been so focused on that one character rather than building the ensemble as was the case in past Trek shows.
I’ve no idea of what’s going on with S3 and S4 but it seems the reactions from people have been mixed to say the least.
I’m waiting for the series to conclude and revisit it then maybe. Sometimes the passage of time can improve one’s perception of its actual quality.
I agree it was a mistake to focus only on Burnham. Big mistake . The bridge crew are completely wasted and could be replaced with card board cut- outs and nobody would know the difference.
Actually I do remember reading a post where you said you liked the first season the most. Third season does seem to be pretty divisive as well for a lot of people. I think for me I mostly enjoy the setting more than anything.
So if you don’t like Discovery you aren’t an actual fan of Star Trek? Doesn’t that kind of make you a gatekeeper? And Discovery season are well under half of the episodes of other series so it will have to make it well past season 8 to reach the actual episode numbers. Now, I don’t like Discovery but I am also not rooting for it to go away either. If Star Trek fans are enjoying it, I think that’s great and I hope it continues to be enjoyable for them, I can choose to shut it off.
Ironic that you imply that “gatekeepers” are Trek fans who think Star Trek Discovery sucks. Yet in the end of your post you do actual gatekeeping when you say, “…and only actual fans will be watching.”
Anybody want to tell him?
I think paramount + is different management than cbs all access I think they renew shows differently , also mayor of Kingston has not been renewed yet
Paramount+ is merely a rebrand of CBS All Access. They might’ve had a management shuffle simultaneously with the rebrand, but they’re not distinct entities — they’re the same.
There has been a major change in management of streaming overall and Paramount+ specifically.
To be fair, Discovery has always been renewed around the airing of the sixth episode of all its seasons.
The Season Four renewal came the day after the Season Three premiere, so this isn’t always the case. Variety Article on October 16th announcing the news: https://variety.com/2020/tv/news/star-trek-discovery-renewed-season-4-cbs-all-access-1234807650/
It is pretty weird that they haven’t just gone and renewed yet. Has me wondering if it’s diverging completely into multiple spinoff territory or something.
We wouldn’t have expected an announcement before the season premiered.
Considering that Sonequa has young children and shooting ran well into late summer in Toronto, it’s not surprising that a longer production hiatus was needed. As well, it doesn’t sound as though S5 has been broke by the writers so there wouldn’t be the basis for a season order.
In the meantime, Picard S3 is in production. More, for SNW, the guild listings and insider notices show that preproduction is underway in Toronto for S2.
So, unless the intent is to double up and have more than one series dropping episodes each week, there’s room in the schedule to wait a bit for Discovery S5.
All of that makes sense, of course. It’s just that, in the past, renewals have been announced within days of a premiere. Your points about extenuating circumstances could certainly contribute, yeah.
Not actually true and a lot of people keep repeating this inaccurate info. The renewal dates have differed – the Season One renewal was announced about six weeks into the run while Season Three was very early, the day after the first episode aired. Season Two was about three episodes in before it got renewed.
So there really is no typical time they’ve announced another Discovery pick up.
They just took Discovery back? That’s it? There must be more juice to the story. I see two possible scenarios. Either Netflix complained that DSC didn’t generate as many subscribers as planned, so they asked Paramount to take it back (or they executed a contractual clause). Or the show was still raking in lots of subscribers and Paramount ended up paying a boatload of money for a hot property to get it back. Either way this is a very remarkable move.
It’s even more remarkable considering how hastily the deal was executed. At the time the rights returned, they had no alternative (backup) plan to utilize the rights in Europe. Waiting for someone to spill the beans.
My guess is the latter: they bought out/paid back Netflix’s licensing fee.
Netflix didn’t want it anymore, that’s a fact. They knew they were promoting a competitor. If they could, they would have jumped this ship by the third season. And not because the show didn’t have an audience — it had. It showed up in the Netflix Top 10 during Season 3 in major markets (UK, Germany, France)… The problem began when CBS sold Picard to Prime Video. Then Netflix saw the writing on the wall. They wouldn’t have Star Trek on the long run. It would be like the Defenders and Marvel, with Disney+ coming up…
I seriously doubt Netflix didn’t want it anymore. It was paying a boatload for it, but it was performing well, and in international markets where it had a stranglehold on the streaming market. While they had the rights to it, it didn’t matter that Paramount+ was coming into some of their markets – they wouldn’t have had Discovery, so they’d be at an even bigger disadvantage. All Netflix cares about is subscriber growth.
You argument goes to why ViacomCBS would want to cut Netflix off though – they were feeding competitors, and with Netflix, one whose dominance is a direct threat to ViacomCBS’ broadcast outlets and theatrical movie business. ViacomCBS has a very long history of not taking a long view of anything and just making deals for a short term gain, so while it hurts our pocketbooks and inconveniences people in dozens of countries where there’s no P+ coming soon, it’s smart for them to start hoarding their shows and films, finally. They are the strongest weapons they have for growth and to keep a seat at the media empire table.
I worked for Netflix as a Star Trek consultant. It’s not an argument. It’s a fact.
Exactly. There must be more to this story. The cast of Discovery was still advertising the Netflix release few weeks before it was pulled from there. If this was a planned move they would have done it way sooner and had the PlutoTV and Paramount+ releases outside USA on the same day as it premiered inside the USA.
According to the Deadline article ViacomCBS paid money to Netflix to get it back.
A rare wise move by Viacom. Star Trek: Discovery is not only the best Trek series ever made, it’s the greatest sci-fi show ever produced. Making it an exclusive sub-driver for P+ should have it chasing down Netflix in no time soon (as the Internet proves that there are hundreds of millions of fans of the show worldwide).
I can’t tell if you’re joking. Assuming you are not, I applaud you for your enthusiasm. I wish to be as excited again about a Star Trek series. Don’t get me wrong, I enjoy Discovery, but can’t say its the best sci-fi ever.
I could swear I saw him state a few weeks ago he was going to start sarcastically praising the show because that would not offend the moderators.
Yes, I remember to. I think he is just trolling us.
Brilliant.
Thank you for providing my first genuine laugh of the day, good one.
I don’t know if Discovery is the greatest sci fi show ever made. If you haven’t watched Under the Dome or Salvation, you’re seriously missing out on iconic television.
In my opinion, thanks to the international fans’ rightfully justified backlash, I honestly think Discovery is on its last legs – we would have known by now if a fifth season was to happen and thanks to that backlash, I highly doubt a fifth season is going to happen despite some hints from Michelle Paradise.
just a note: I am taking a mental picture of this comment and Tiberius Mudd’s comment above (re: Discovery being the greatest sci-fi show ever produced). Very interested in seeing if history proves either of these statements even close to accurate.
And yet, there’s Bob Bakish, telling the world the Discovery had a great 4th season opening and they are very pleased with it.
First off, where are people getting this odd notion that Discovery always got renewed 2-3 weeks after its season started? The first renewal didn’t happen until after a month of the first season and by episode 6 of the show.
Secondly, the overwhelming majority of shows don’t get officially renewed until the end of their current seasons or even after the season is over. It was like that for decades. But thanks to our strange new streaming world where shows are renewed before their next season even airs like Picard got, people now have these nutty expectations. Until ANYTHING is officially said, we don’t know. Yes it could be cancelled after this season, but given what the CEO said about the show, it sounds like it will be the opposite.
And then you have to wonder, if they do plan to cancel the show this season, why push so hard to get it internationally? Especially since ironically most of the world won’t even get Paramount+ until after fourth season is well over. Just let the last season play out on Netflix and no one really loses anything in the process. It seems like they have big plans for the show going forward but I could be wrong of course.
Business is business, but these folks need to do more to pamper the Star Trek fan base, just as Star Wars has done for years. The abrupt change left many international fans (including me) with a ‘bad feeling about this,’ and it remains to be seen where the franchise will end up. Kurtzman now interviews like a corporate shill, and provides long non-answers to questions we’d like answers to (see “crossovers”). Instead, he should (like he did with Talos IV in S2) be dropping hints which keep us all on the edge of our seats. Next, they’ll sell Trek to Disney tomorrow (please, yes), and tell us it’s what they wanted to do all along to increase cashflow, and the next flick will be kicked to 2026.
Pampering the Trek fan base is an impossible task. Ask ten random Trek fans how they’d like to be pampered, you’ll get twelve differing responses.
Problem is that Paramount will never pull an audience like Netflix or Prime do. This means that they’re alienating casual content viewers, who spread word of new series they stumble across and word of mouth keeps series like Star Trek going. Discovery going to Paramount is effectively making the cast unemployed the end of this season as it won’t be pulling viewership numbers like it used too. Sure, Paramount benefit in the short-term, but long-term the cast and casual/potential new fans suffer due to the series being cancelled. Big Pond. Little Fish.
There is no way it’s getting canceled after they just bought the international rights back.
I’m not sure what you’re even trying to get at with
“Paramount will never pull an audience like Netflix and Prime do.”
Do you think they get paid by the viewer? Right now they get 0 subscribers from those markets. Do you know what is a lot more than zero? So long as they bring in more than they were getting paid by the 3rd parties it’s a win.
I’m in the UK, it took 3 weeks to get the link to Pluto TV and then you can only seem to watch Live and the episodes prior to episode 3 were not available. Questions to Pluto support have so far resulted in zero replies. Thanks Paramount for totally spoiling Star trek for the rest of the world.
I think you were doing something wrong… you just go to the Pluto website or download the app. No need to “get the link”. I have the Pluto app and as soon as it was announced that DIS S4 would air on Pluto I started getting notifications through the app in the days before to let me know when it would be on (sadly it’s only available “live”, not on demand, but it’s aired rwice – Friday and Sunday).
If you follow this website you would have seen the news days before the episode aired so why didn’t you just go to the website (no need for an account) on the night?
You are right that past episodes are not available on demand, but that’s part of Pluto’s model of emulating live TV. It’s annoying but it is what it is. However, I don’t think this is Pluto’s fault and I have had no problem enjoying this series through the platform in the UK.
Duh…why is this news? I already subscribe to Paramount+ so I have no issue with this buyback…except…for the love of god, Paramount….add a SKIP INTRO to your app!
At least as early as last Thursday, one was added, at least for me… the only annoying thing is, is you DO want to watch the intro, the obtrusive “SKIP INTRO” button stays on the screen the entire time instead of expiring after a few seconds like everywhere else.
I have an Android Sony TV and it has a skip intro button. However, I always watch the intro! It must not be on every application yet. I know a software engineer who works on the viacom streaming team. It’s hard for them to unify features across all the platforms in a timely manner. In general iOS is given priority.
I already pay for Netflix, Prime, Disney and Uk TV licence. Just cannot keep paying and paying. For me Viacom are too late to the party, sorry
Agreed. My various subs add up more than cable. I’m going to cancel a few. I don’t watch my TV anymore anyway.
If money really is tight the advantage of streaming services is that you can cancel your subscription at any time and switch over to another service to watch something on there. Then go back once you’re finished.
New viewers OR those not familiar with the character and actions of Michael Burnham in first half of S1 may offer salvation for Discovery and Captain Burnham. I feel for Sonequa Martin-Green because she got saddled playing an unlikeable character who was a Starfleet mutineer and criminal. How in the world would she ever endeer herself to legacy fans.
That said, P+ and Kurtzman have done their best and a pretty good job, trying to redeem the character and they have moved the show into the 32nd century, far away from those always wanting to compare the show to what have come before. Perhaps the best thing is that Discovery no longer has to standalone waving the Trek banner, with a plethora of shows now available to attract new and old fans alike.
In many ways, I agree with those who said this season is probably where the show should have started. That said, we would not have SNW, so I guess we just have to say – It’s been a long road, getting from there to here…!
I liked Michael from the beginning. Obviously she made a mistake in the pilot, but her actions were understandable and they came from a place of love. Tom, Chakotay, and B’Elanna all committed much more serious crimes than Michael committed.
Oh I agree that her crimes in many ways MAY have been at or below what some of the Maquis did BUT we never got to see first hand what they did, it was just hearsay or in the past.
In Discovery Michael’s crimes were shoved in the viewers’ faces and highlighted in the premiere. One could also say that starting a galactic war with the Klingons that got her mentor (and a very likeable Starfleet Captain Georgiou) killed was way worse.
Michael wasn’t really responsible for starting the war. T’Kuvma was going to start a war with the Federation no matter what Starfleet did. And Georgiou stopped Michael before she was able to launch her preemptive attack anyway.
That is true. It just gets on my nerves that her answer to every problem before this season was on a spectrum from insubordination to treason.
Don’t get wrong Kirk would go rogue but it wasn’t his go to response every single time.
“And so, we now have that property globally.”
Ummm, it’s still on Crave and Sci Fi channel in Canada.
That’s an awfully vague comment about the subscribers. It’s lacking in actual numbers so I’d wager there is a lot of spin on that. As usual.
What are you talking about? Obviously it brings in enough to not only justify foregoing the money Netflix was paying them but to also justify buying Netflix out of the current contract.