After the big news broke on Friday that Paramount Global is canceling and removing a number of shows including Star Trek: Prodigy, the TrekMovie podcasting teams assembled for an emergency pod to talk about it. Kayla and Brian from the Shuttle Pod join Tony and Laurie from All Access Star Trek to break down the news and put it into context with what is going on with Paramount and the streaming business. The podcasters also express their sadness to see such a great show get canceled but are hopeful it will find a new home, as Paramount has said they plan to license both season 1 and the upcoming second season to another network. They also have a frank discussion about the state of Star Trek merchandise and about what all of this could mean for the future of Star Trek on TV.
Links:
‘Star Trek: Prodigy’ Has Been Canceled By Paramount+, Seasons 1 & 2 Being Shopped To Other Networks
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Prodigy being erased is awful. I feel so sorry for the hardworking cast and crew that their work is going to be scrubbed, possibly forever. It’s just such…. corporate bullshit.
Erased is exactly the way I’m feeling about this.
How to infuriate fans and creators all in one fell swoop.
There’s a petition on this. It’s building support rapidly this weekend. I hope it overtakes both the Legacy and Pike’s Enterprise (SNW) ones.
Signed!
Sure, I’ll sign it it NY minute. It should easily overtake the disappointing Legacy petition numbers.
And just between you and me (I mean it, don’t tell anyone!), I hope the Legacy petition numbers stay down…
Maybe it will surpass the SNW petition but Legacy is literally double that one now. And I never signed either one but I think I will sign this one because it’s looking that bleak. But I’m just being honest, if PRO was anywhere near the interest of SNW or LEG, it wouldn’t have gotten cancelled after its first season.
It sounds like the problem was the Nickelodeon views.
Prodigy’s numbers on Paramount+ weren’t far off from Lower Decks by any measure that’s in the public domain.
The thing is, Nickelodeon just hasn’t been doing well overall. The pandemic sent parents and kids looking for streaming content for their demographic.
It sounds like almost the same problem I heard TAS got cancelled for and that was because more adults were watching it than the intended target audience which were kids. And obviously this isn’t shocking. I think ALL of us predicted this lol. Star Trek can attract kids since ironically I think most people on this site started watching it as kids, but it’s always been seen as an adult driven show and it’s probably going to take more than one animated show to erase that label. It’s not going to be MCU or Transformers overnight.
But obviously P+ doesn’t seem to have much faith in the show because they could’ve just picked it up from Nick full time and made it exclusive to P+. Instead they are tryin g to sell the show off, so something else must be going on there. The podcast did speculate maybe with adding Showtime next week, they just want more adult fare and PRO obviously doesn’t fit that, but who knows?
I’ve heard through the grapevine that this was a Paramount decision, not a Nick decision. Nick wanted to retain the show, but Paramount chose to axe it.
I think you pulled that rumor from somewhere else.
I very much doubt a petition will have any effect, but I wish the petitioners luck.
I don’t think it will do much either, but I signed it anyway. And I just checked it again but it’s actually getting signed at a crazy pace. It’s already at 16,000 signatures in just two days and already more than halfway than the Pike show petition signatures. That took months just to reach 30,000. And it’s waaaaaay past Discovery to get another season lol. That’s only at 3,000 and been up since March. Tells you just how much people truly love that show.
Or maybe it just wasn’t commercially successful?
Also, a show being cancelled doesn’t mean it’s erased or scrubbed.
Cancelled is one thing. This has been cancelled and it’s being removed from streaming. There is going to be no way to watch it shortly. That’s as good as it being erased.
It will probably end up on PlutoTV
Screw Wall Street.
Sure, but the reality is enough people didn’t watch it. I think part of the problem was that unlike the outstanding first half of S1, which came across as a cool space adventure to bring kids into Star Trek, the second half of S1 went way too much into Voyager fan service, which frankly kids would not understand and/or not really care about — it should have stayed with the kids as the central focus.
And because of this, we are never going to get a Janeway/Voyager follow-on series now, as Paramount is going to conclude, right or wrong, that Prodigy showed that VOY audience pull for a new series as disappointing.
How much Voyager stuff was there, really? Janeway was a major character just like in the first half of the season, and Chakotay showed up for about a minute. Otherwise it was still mostly about the Protostar crew and the Vau Nakat.
There wasn’t much Voyager stuff. It was only a sprinkle. The person commenting is exaggerating.
Not at all, my point, and several others have commented similarly in the last two days, is that when you compare the second half of Season 1 to the first half of Season 1, there is a lot more of Janeway and Voyager fan service in those latter eps.
This is not really up for debate — watch the eps again and see for yourself.
I don’t think it’s that. I was always extremely skeptical of the marketing thesis that kiddie Trek was going to act as a gateway drug for the genuine article.
Prodigy was originally positioned as a kids’ show, targeted at the elementary school set. But the main characters (except for Rok-Tank) were teens, and the themes were probably too mature for the elementary school set.
But it was never going to appeal to teens, either: the plots were far too simplistic for young adult drama. The surest way to alienate them was to present a homily-like down version of a serious sci-fi drama and to tell them they had to watch it (“stick to the kids’ menu”) because they were teenagers. I am sure that plenty of people on this site, myself included, first became acquainted with Star Trek as teenagers, and by “Star Trek” I mean genuine TOS or Berman-era Star Trek. We didn’t need a gateway drug.
The audience for this show ended up being hardcore Star Trek fans, and they were subscribing to P+ anyway.
Exactly. Kids don’t care about stuff from a show 30 years ago.
Yeah! Down with The Man! How dare investors (maybe including your 401(k)) refuse to finance something that few people were watching!
Next think you know The Man won’t want to subsidize Writers Rooms where you got two extra people collecting paychecks on an 8-ep streaming show just because that’s what worked on old TV shows where they had 25 eps per year with weekly deadlines.
Whoops — the nerve of me to not just surrender to the subjective group-think on this. No, I am changing my mind — WGA is 100% correct on all issues, their are no economic issues with streaming, and the studios and movie producers and financiers are all greedy bastards who just want to completely screw the creative trades….is that better?
Please sir, may I have more Kool-Aid?
Well, I’m glad you changed your mind.
;-)
They should replace all those lazy writers with writers from Korea. The Koreans make great shows and movies.
It’s not just Prodigy. I don’t know how many people were watching that, but I do know that shows with high viewing numbers and shows that nobody ever had a chance to watch have been sacrificed to appease a bunch of coked-up Wall Street douchebags.
If the show had just been canceled, I would be disappointed but I wouldn’t be pissed off. Shows getting cancelled is normal, and it’s happened to Trek more than once. What pisses me off is removing the shows from platforms so that nobody can see them, and refusing to air content that has already been produced and paid for.
What pisses me off is removing the shows from platforms so that nobody can see them, and refusing to air content that has already been produced and paid for.
Yeah, this is really asinine. However, I have a region-free Blu-Ray, and with that capability, I have found that a lot of the studios put streaming stuff on disc overseas (that they have taken off their platforms, and which they did not release on disc in NA/Europe), particularly in Asia, and you can get them that way. For instance, I just got Willow the series this way (Blu-Ray) on Ebay for $25 — from India, but it contains the English audio track (5.1 DTS MA). I have several other streaming movies that I have obtained this way as well.
You probably bought a bootleg. Fine by me, I’ve bought quite a few for shows that are not otherwise available. And will happily keep right on doing so, if needed.
Maybe — it certainly looks legit in this case, but on other stuff I’ve ordered I’ve received obvious bootlegs on stuff I just can’t get here in the U.S.
But I do go by your policy as well. I respect IP and will pay the cost for stuff that’s available directly to me in the U.S., but if it’s not available because the studios won’t release it or it’s out of circulation here, I reserve the right to order it from overseas, and hope for the best that it’s legit, but no promises. :-)
Exactly mate. “Ooh they’re so hardworking and I like this show, so it’s a disgrace that it’s being cancelled”. Unfortunately “hard work” doesn’t necessarily mean quality or success.
Why say that? As much as we’d love to think that venture capitalists have endless pots of money to throw at failing business ventures, they don’t. These people will fund businesses for years if there’s some light at the end of the tunnel, but for a lot of these streamers, there isn’t. Paramount’s studio property is actually worth more then the business (30BN vs 22/27BM, depending on how you view the valuation). Paramount Global is selling off the assets now to keep afloat, that doesn’t say much for the company’s prospects.
Trek as an IP has value, someone will buy it. Cheer up, for all of you who have spent decades bitching to high heaven about what it takes to get rid of JJ and Alex, now you know. You all should be thrilled about this.
I have no complaints about JJ or Alex.
As someone who generally likes what Kurtzman has done, it’s more proof you’re just asking for trouble if you’re always looking for the next ‘savior’ of Star Trek. Abrams, Orci, Kurtzman, Fuller all got berated by fans over their ideas in the end. I guarantee you if things really go south at Paramount and Kurtzman is out of a job in a few years, many fans will definitely celebrate (ML31 especially lol) but then the next one will probably just be villianized more probably by the same people who wanted him gone the second they make a canon error or give Kirk a daughter.
It’s always a ‘be careful what you wish for’ dilemma.
What’s worse, if Star Trek winds up under the thumb of someone like Comcast or Disney, it won’t be anything close to as big a priority for its overlords as it is to Paramount.
Which means that the new owners may be willing to experiment a bit, rather than live off nostalgia. (You don’t tend to take risks with the crown jewels.) They might have tell stories rather than coast off f/x work. This could very well be a positive thing.
Whoever buys the IP is going to do their research. If what we see here is any example, it’s an audience who talks up wanting something new, or different, until someone does something new or different. Then it’s all knives, pitchforks and torches for not having plywood spaceships crewed by white men…..
This is why you never pay attention to trek fans.
The irony is Bryan Fuller DID experiment when he made Discovery. Yes, he was already gone by the time the show went into production but it was all based around his ideas. And how did that go? DIS was wildly different in so many ways from the tone and structure of the previous shows. He basically soft rebooted Star Trek. But fans rejected it so badly they tried to make it more fun again and nostalgia lite in the second season with Pike and Spock and then threw the show in the future in season three.
Now it wasn’t that it looked and felt different that people had problem with alone (and yes others appreciated these differences as well including the Klingons), but a lot of the writing was also just considered bad too.
And look at Lower Decks? ALSO an experiment. It’s the first Star Trek comedy, right? Now unlike Discovery, most fans seem to at least like that show although IIRC you don’t. And that’s fine, but it’s going against the grain of what’s come before as well. The other big change, it’s a show not about the senior staff but its lowest ranked officers while being a raunchy comedy. But yes, it greatly coasts on nostalgia as well but it’s still a very different show from came before too it’s just being made by someone obsessed with the TNG/Berman era. But there are tons of people just offended over the idea the show even exists for trying to make Star Trek a comedy.
This is the problem. Even back in the Berman era, they tried to do something very different with DS9, which IIRC you don’t love that show either. Again, that’s FINE, but at the time there were a lot of people who had issues with DS9 (as much as people seem to forget this) and a big reason they went back to the safer direction with Voyager and Enterprise. DS9 got a lot of the same complaints DIS did in fact, ie, it was too dark and violent.
Star Trek has always had this weird dilemma by fans who claim to want something different…but also the same. I think if DIS was a bigger hit in terms of audience reception, the later shows may have all looked very different. But the reality is you can only go so far with experimenting if it just feels like something too different altogether which DIS got a lot of complaints about.
I don’t think I’ve ever said *that* — I do think TNG is superior, and ENT more or less tied with it. It’s better than VOY. I dislike the Vic Fontaine bits, and the Wacky Ferengi (TM) episodes, and I think they went to the well too many times with the mirror universe. But the characterization was excellent, and it had many first-rate episodes.
VOY’s problem was that they never really explored its premise thoroughly, a few episodes like “Year of Hell” and “Equinox” aside (both of which were among the series’ best). I do wonder if that was because it was UPN’s flagship product.
OK fair enough!
Continuing the above. It seems to me that after TNG, Berman basically decided to bifurcate TNG into two: the political thriller parts with DS9, and the exploration parts with VOY. I’m not really sure that move worked, and when they came together again with ENT they more or less had a winner.
Berman MAY have tried to split the two, but only because of the direction DS9 was going by the time VOY premiered. I think VOY’s main goal was to return to the TOS/TNG roots of exploration. Unfortunately, I think it suffered from some bad choices in terms of some of the initial new aliens they created that just didn’t resonate with the fans (e.g. Kazon and Vidiians). I think they tried to start off by attempting some new and different ideas with species like that, and when it wasn’t working as well as hoped, they went back to the tried and true from TOS and TNG such as Romans, Q and of course the Borg.
All that said, the idea that ENT was some sort of combination of concepts that created a “winner” seems like a stretch to me. The show was generally panned by the core fans in seasons 1 and 2, and the Xindi focus of season 3 nearly got the show cancelled. Season 4 is really the only season that people felt like ENT was on the right path, and that’s mainly credited to Manny Coto. But even then, they couldn’t give it a proper ending and still tried to pull fans in with the return of Riker and Troi – leading to the worst ending to a Trek show so far (in my opinion, in some ways worse than the unintentional series finale of TOS).
From what I’ve seen, SNW is really the first series since TNG to stir fans up enough to claim that Star Trek is finally back on track. Not that I (nor many fans) think it’s supremely better than DS9, VOY or ENG, but that it is finally a return to something closer to what is seen as Star Trek. I personally have been a bit disappointed in SNW on the level of what is created with so few episodes, but until PIC season 3 debuted earlier this year, SNW season 1 was the first almost completely Trek-like season of Kurtzman era.
I think the main difference between DS9 and VOY was that the DS9 showrunners had to deal with a lot less studio interference compared to Voyager. That was part of what eventually sunk Enterprise as well.
Yeah VOY and ENT being on UPN sounded like the real problem. They just didn’t have the freedom TNG and DS9 did. DS9 was able to be a serialized show when they wanted to broaden its storylines but VOY was mandated to stay episodic as much as possible.
I don’t really get the feeling that LDS is hated by that many people. Is it different – in a way – but it also has a lot of the feel of Berman-era Trek. I never see the level of criticism and dislike (if not hate) voiced at LDS as what I’ve seen towards DIS. I know it’s not UNIVERSALLY liked, but I really do think there’s a much more positive feel towards it.
Yeah I shouldn’t have said ‘tons’, that’s clearly an exaggeration on my part since I said most fans likes it. It’s obviously very popular in the majority of the fanbase. I’m convinced that show can go the longest than all the other shows (certainly more than Prodigy lol) because it’s probably cheap enough and unlike Prodigy it seems to have a very loyal fanbase.
I do think in season one, there was definitely more division in it at the beginning, but by the end of the season it won over a lot of fans fast. And it seems to be getting more popular with every season.
To me, it’s kind of shocking how popular it is, especially on this board. And I say that as someone who also loves it, but I just knew I would be in the minority here. Happy that isn’t the case. ;)
Who’s Zack Snyder working for these days? He got a lot of rope before they cut it….
He is creating the rip-off ‘Battle Beyond The Stars’ franchise ‘Rebel Moon’ on Netflix.
Mickey Mouse would look great in a Starfleet uniform.
Dude shows get cancelled all the time. Big deal.
At least buy Wall Street some flowers first.
The Expanse model to move the show to a different network that would actually fund new seasons seems highly unlikely to me as I don’t think Paramount would let others control BOTH production and distribution rights to their Star Trek franchise IP. In the Expanse situation, at 3rd party production company controlled the IP, and thus could shop the series around to finance new seasons — that is not the case here.
It’s not impossible that this all could be worked out. I just view it as highly unlikely that Paramount would be willing to do that, and using it as a tax write-off doesn’t help at all.
In fact, I am somewhat skeptical that we will ever see one ep of S2 now that Paramount has mentioned it will be a tax write-off. If you don’t believe me, try to find the WB movie Batgirl anywhere to stream.
I’m not sure I’d turn to “The Expanse” as an example of a possible happy rescue of Prodigy’s fortunes in any case. While arguably better than no resolution at all, that truncated final season was, if not a total disaster, a decided letdown for a show that had distinguished itself with some really impressive world building, but mostly had no room for much in its sixth year but plot, all because Jeff Bezos had to get cheap in the home stretch..
I agree with that from the story viewpoint — I was talking about the “shopping it around” business model. I am guessing your read the final 3 novels like I have that are after the time jump, and disappointed that we did not get to see that truly mind-bending awesome science fiction that are in the final three novels, which frankly, blow away the first six in my opinion. The entire set of novels are a masterwork.
Off topic, but as a veteran Russia hand I gotta say it: TNG, in its swan song, yet again predicted major developments in Russian politics.
Military force turns on itself, nearly succeeds in destroying the state, only for a rushed resolution in the last five minutes.
/s, but only just. For those who weren’t there at the time, the first part of the Klingon civil war episode “Redemption” came mere months before the August 1991 coup.
We now return you to your regularly schedule Prodigy discussion.
They said it was for kids to bring them into the franchise. I question whether that is true. Of course I can only be anecdotal about this, but I don’t believe kids are really watching cartoons any more.
My 4 nephews are aged 6,8,9 and 11 and not one of them watches cartoons or even want to watch a kids movie. All they do is game. Gaming constantly over and over again, and most of the other boys at their school are the same.
I of course have no idea about girls as I don’t have a niece, but I would still believe scifi is still predominantly male.
Good point — and obviously they have found that out the hard way.
Kids are definitely still watching cartoons, the BO for animated movies proves it. In fact, the irony is they were talking about doing a Prodigy movie because they see how much money animated movies can make with generally smaller budgets. You add merchandising on top of it. it’s even bigger.
Now all that said maybe they don’t watch them at the level like they used to either. Saturday morning cartoons used to be a big deal for kids for decades and that died off long ago along with afternoon cartoons etc. Of course now there are cable channels like Nick to pick up the slack but who knows.
The only reason Saturday morning cartoons and afternoon cartoons disappeared is because the cable networks made that content readily available at any time. Streaming has done the same, but of course the cable networks remain. Trust me, kids still view cartoons/animated content, but it’s a lot different than those of us who grew up in the 70’s – 90’s. And like almost all media, it’s also a lot more splintered and diverse than it used to be. The idea that kids “like” YouTube and TikTok channels – with some watching more video on those platforms than what I did in my entire childhood – blows my mind…
Yeah that’s what I was thinking as well. Apparently Nickelodeon is not doing as well as it used to but again that’s probably just due to streaming today more than anything.
As a father of a 5 (almost 6 in July) year old, it really depends on how they are raised and what they are exposed to. My kid loves cartoons, but he also likes live action. He’ll definitely watch a kid movie as well, but usually with us as a family and not on his own. But he does enjoy gaming on his tablet as well, but we limit him to no more than 3 hours a day on that device (and that’s already pushing it according to experts). Even then, he’ll watch video content on his tablet some days for a full 3-hours and never touch a game. The rest of the time, he can either watch TV with my wife or me, or he can play. He usually chooses playing for the most part.
I’m not saying my family is the standard, but I know we aren’t alone. It just depends on your view of screen time and use of mobile or gaming devices. But to claim that no one watches cartoons anymore would mean that multiple cable and streaming services would be going out of business. As far as I can tell, that’s not the case. Disney is still an animation powerhouse, and Nickelodeon is a close second. Other than some recent fails, Pixar is still considered one of the best companies in entertainment – and that’s not just limiting it to animation. And, in case you didn’t know it, the current top movie at the box office is animated/a cartoon (Spiderman: Across the Spiderverse).
Cartoons/animation are not dead. But Prodigy definitely fought an uphill battle. If yo tune into animated content that is aimed at the same demographic as Prodigy, you’ll find comedy-based shows that usually center on over the top characters in a comical situation; comic-book adaptations or shows centered on comic-book characters; and lastly, Star Wars is pretty popular in the pre-teen and teenage demographics, but that’s because most kids were brainwashed to love Star Wars in the womb (just kidding, but only kinda…).
Hello trek movie podcasters,
Thank you for discussing the cancellation and what it means for the future. I don’t keep up with these studios or wall street. So, I appreciate you taking your time out with a breaking news podcast and laying it all out for us.
I agree with you Laurie. I felt Prodigy was the best of new trek. It honored the past, gave us new characters, new worlds, and new aliens. The characters were rich, animation was terrific, and gave me the post-nemesis show I’ve been waiting for. I loved seeing how Starfleet was experimenting with the tech brought back by Voyager, the state of the Borg, and how the transwarp hubs brought Delta Quadrant aliens to the UFP. I loved it. It is something the live action shows can’t and won’t do.
Anyways, thanks for the podcast. Hopefully, P+ will get their **** together and maybe find a home for Prodigy.
Do you guys think Star Trek should return to broadcast television?
Return to broadcast television? Are you suggesting Trek could be turned into an obnoxious game show or a sitcom that twelve people watch? ;-)
I’m not sure anyone is looking to hitch their wagon to that fading star.
I don’t think Trek could survive broadcast TV. Even in the fledgling UPN days Enterprise still got cancelled. Shows like Supergirl couldn’t survive on CBS broadcast.
I never could get past the pilot, but I know this show meant a great deal to people and I’m sorry for their loss.
It wasn’t cringeworthy. It hinted at a sleek, post-LCARS design aesthetic for Star Trek, something Discovery never achieved. It at least introduced a credible new adversary for the Federation. But the reality is that it was always going to deliver homilies (“we wanna be scientists!!!”), and while I don’t disagree with that kind of jubilation, we were never going to get deliciously subversive episodes like “In the Pale Moonlight” (“sometimes the ends to justify the means”) or “Tapesty” (“take risks and get noticed, even at the expense of being a team player”).
I think it bears remembering that people who post (much less read) a Star Trek blog are completists (hey, I confess to know way too much TNG-era trivia!), which means that they’re very much an unrepresentative sample.
Like Laurie, it was my favorite show for the modern era. I fell in love with this thing. And now I just heard it’s leaving the site Tuesday. I had no idea it was going off this fast. I was thinking of rewatching the whole thing again before it left but I’m way too busy to watch 20 episodes in the next few days. So c’est la vie!
I understand if others didn’t like it or felt it was too kiddie, but for me this was the best Trek show since the 90s easily.
Yeah I’ve been trying to cram in a rewatch but there isn’t enough time. I put the dvd in my Amazon cart (first ten episodes) but it was sold out by the time I went back to buy it! Amazon is selling the first 20 episodes digitally so at least there’s that.
Well finally listened to the podcast, which was very informative but man sounded really dire.
But it made clear this is sadly beyond one little animated kid’s show and that the company is really hurting. It’s just crazy how bad this has gotten and so fast. I can’t speak for anyone else, but I thought once the merge finally happened, we were now seeing a new revitalized Paramount and that this was only going to be great news for Star Trek going forward. That’s around the time they (yet again) announced another movie and the lackluster (to put it mildly) CBSAllAccess was turning into a real streaming service with Paramount+. I knew it was still small and had to grow to compete with the big boys but everything was looking up. The day the site added all the movies, for the first time anywhere along with the shows, it finally felt like both the company and the service was really geared for tons of new Star Trek content. I truly thought the movie was mostly getting made to push Paramount+ more than anything.
Now listening to this podcast, and I know it’s just speculation, people are suggesting P+ can be gone and they could be licensing Star Trek to other streaming sites or studios again. And I agree and said this myself I could now see the original shows like DIS, PIC or SNW given to other sites in reruns. But now they could go even farther with it if the company can’t sustain to really give attention to Star Trek. And I also agree originally I did think it was a good idea to have the old shows in one specific place to drive fans to the site, but I don’t think it’s really working out as planned. Of course it was always better for them to be on multiple sites and MUCH bigger places like Netflix and Amazon. I think a lot of new fans were introduced to the franchise that way.
But being solely on Paramount+ has ironically hampered that because as said there are still tons of people who just doesn’t think the service is worth getting and that still includes tons of Star Trek fans. I still think we will get other shows and including the Legacy show, but maybe we will eventually just see them on other sites.
P+ is like UPN 2.0. Yes it was the first time Trek was back on network TV back in the day but UPN had practically no reach with affiliates across the US, certainly not to the extent of NBC/CBS/ABC/FOX. And P+ is the streaming version of that. But despite that shows like PIC S3 did make some pretty impressive ratings lately. Of course I’m pretty sure that is US based only.
I was hoping you guys would post a discussion about this ASAP, especially since we are days away from it vanishing. The point was raised by Anthony that 40 episodes is a good run! That amounts to 4 seasons of Lower Decks for example. So assuming we get to see Season 2 (no reason to doubt it), I think that would be a successful run all things considered. A continuation seems unlikely outside of Paramount considering how Star Trek is run and managed, and I don’t see that changing unless Paramount+ folds. It also has to be something of a tough sell for another streaming service under those restrictions, so they may not be able to find a buyer at all.
Yeah 40 episodes in today’s world is actually a good run. I was honestly hoping for 5 seasons and that would’ve given us a nice 100 episodes, but that was probably always a pipe dream lol. But I think 60 episodes would’ve been great and I was hoping it could get just one more season. Maybe it still will someplace else, but I agree it’s probably unlikely.
The whole thing just sucks though. Again, if you have to cancel it fine, fine, but keep the damn thing on P+ and have both seasons up there so it’s part of the library like everything else. It’s so bizarre it will still be considered canon but yet on a different site if it gets sold at all.
I agree, this is so disrespectful to the creators and fans of the show and it’s amazing to me that the would erode their golden goose like this. It just shows you that things are dire…or the leadership is poor. This does feel like an Earthquake for the future of Star Trek, this feels like they are parting out the franchise, once again.
They are employees, they can be let go at anytime. Respect or disrespect has nothing to do with it.
I don’t understand why they still haven’t put the rest of the first season on iTunes? Or even ST:TAS which is the only Trek not available other than the original pilot episode, The Cage. They’re just leaving money on the table that they could be benefiting from now. It deeply concerns me that by not making even a digital release of these shows possible that there’s the real possibility of them being lost forever…
Paramount has always been lucky as opposed to good (in terms of its management), but Moonves’ push to move them to streaming will be his legacy and the company’s doom. They could’ve been Sony, instead they’re dead.
I already wrote it in another comment, but I wanted to point out that Prodigy is not present in the Kids profiles of my country. my daughters, who wanted to see it again, had to use my adult profile. if this thing also occurs in other countries, it is obvious that the kids cannot find out about the existence of the series. Can anyone tell me if this is a common situation? would it have been enough to insert the series aimed at children in the children’s profile to reach the necessary views?
Paramount+’s algorithms are terrible, this does not surprise me.
Laurie. As soon as I heard this news I immediately thought of you. I know you are a big fan and that Prodigy was your favourite of the new shows. Upsetting when something you love comes to an end but hopefully it will enjoy a legacy on another platform.
Fingers crossed!
This show had a lot of heart, despite some weak writing and an annoyingly written and voiced lead character (Dal). It deserved better than this. Paramount is making one stupid decision after another lately.
Not just Paramount. Hollywood.
So I feel like we’re now all getting affected by these “tax writeoff” cheat codes these studios are doing to us, the fans. The US needs an entire tax overhaul, because to do this not only to the viewers but to the artists as well, to pay them to create something only for it to never see the light of day, all to save a few pennies – it’s just flat wrong. It’s the same profit-driven mindset that has the writers of our beloved shows on strike for a second month now, and ultimately a reflection of the moral bankruptcy of our corporations and the system they serve.
Perhaps, since Paramount+ is about to increase its rates, and we the fans were promised a “one-stop shop” for Star Trek content, it is now the time to cut the cord, so to speak, and all quit en masse. This will send a message to the suits at Paramount that this ain’t cool and Star Trek fans are done with your nonsense. We will do what we’ve always done: buy the discs instead. There isn’t going to be any new Trek content for the foreseeable future after the end of SNW. I don’t think we have a release date for Lower Decks yet? So while everything is on pause as far as our favorite franchise is concerned, let’s all organize to save a few dollars on our end, but send a collective message to a major studio on the other that if it wants its streaming service to be viable, they need to placate the Star Trek fans. And that means not removing the content we come for while also jacking up the prices. I’m sick of this and you should be too! :)
Yeah, what we need is to reform the system so that we get the shows we want, regardless of viewership levels, SAG and WGA need to win all they are asking for at the bargaining table, and Paramount should be forced by law to keep their rates the same.
That’s what we need here — let’s reform the system and take business economics out of the equation. And if the federal government needs to subsidize the industry so that we can get this done, so be it!
I am so sick of this! Take the power away from the greedy corporate bastards and turn it over to the people!
Yeah see it’s this kind of twisting of the message that stands in the way of real change. At no point did I say any of that – in fact quite the opposite. I’m saying let’s literally flex our collective economic muscle to make a point, the same way fans have for decades, the same way Bjo Trimble and hundreds of thousands of fans saved Star Trek in the 60s. Since when did people become so scared of the corporate machine that we dare not challenge it? We as a fan block could literally tank Paramount+ if we all unsubscribed, we are truly that important to their bottom line. Money speaks – so let’s speak. And yes, let’s take the power away from the greedy corporate bastards as long as they continue to act like greedy corporate bastards.
The only value is shareholder value.
The folks at Playmates must be pissed. Hope they’re getting a big check not to sue
Unpopular opinion: I’ve tried really hard to get into Prodigy, but kept tuning out. Maybe I’m not the target audience – I stopped around episodes 7 or 8 but even then it was a chore getting to that point.
And it’s not because it’s animated! I support all things Trek – yes, even though Lower Decks can be downright annoying at times I still look forward to seeing it. And goes without saying I love TAS.
But I dunno, something just didn’t work for me.
I’m the same with Lower Decks, I just find it to be obnoxious and juvenile. When I want that I watch South Park not Star Trek.
What I don’t understand, Tony, is if the the major streamers (Disney, Paramount )are going to sell off their shows for royalties, that is what they used to do before. And then the major streamers bought them back to have their own content. What changed about their economics?
As noted by Brian, much of this has to do with Wall Street. Earlier in the streaming wars companies were being rewarded primarily with subscriber growth and spending on original content. Ceasing licensing to third parties was seen as a way to drive growth. Now Wall Street is pressuring all the companies to show a profit. This is much like the dotcom bubble when investors returned to more traditional fundamentals. So what is old is new again: such as leaning more into advertising on subscriber streaming, free ad-supported cable-TV like streamers (like Pluto) and 3rd party licensing. These write-offs/removals are all part of that new focus on profit. Paramount Global saw it made more financial sense to remove them and sell these shows to third parties.
Thanks for the emergency podcast regarding Prodigy’s cancellation, and the future of all things Trek. I don’t know what’s going to happen in the streaming industry. It seems to be a mess. I sure hope all Trek, old shows, movies and new shows and movies, will stay on one platform and not be split up. But as a fan, I have no control over that. None of us do. Wall Street has a firm grip on everything, and that’s sad. We fans have to play that wait and see game for awhile. One thing is a constant. Trekmovie is keeping me and tons of fans informed every day. You do a fantastic job. Thank you so much. You are helping all us Trek fans to make sense of all this madness and chaos. Keep the info coming.
Options markets are seeing a lot of activity on Paramount Global stock. Anticipation is that there will be some action on the company, soon. Apparently there has been some shorting activity, but it’s not going crazy. M & A is just as viable an option.
Stay tuned, boys and girls…..
It’s hard for me to envision a scenario where Paramount Global doesn’t end up an acquisition target.
The question is tho who? I don’t want to see the Star Trek IP going to Disney!!!
If it weren’t for the complication of the Broadcast assets they’d certainly want to spin-off, I still say this would be a great deal for Apple to finally make a huge purchase and become a bigger player in entertainment.
They’ve never sniffed around at anything more than content and distribution deals, but it would be the least disruptive option, far better than selling the company for parts, especially to other entertainment companies with their own studios and franchises that matter more to them than Paramount’s would. A huge company that won’t sweat incurring debt and can subsidize losses better with their core revenue is a preferable merger partner.
If it can’t be Paramount, the idea of Apple owning Star Trek doesn’t turn my stomach, at least.
Apple’s interest would likely be in the property. The Trek IP may just be a bonus, I understand Bezo’s is a fan.
Disney is having burnout issues with Star Wars and to a lesser extent, Marvel. I doubt there’s much interest in them acquiring Paramount’s catalogue.
There have been reports that Netflix actually looked at it. No indication that they’re still considering it.
I have been a loyal subscriber since DISCO began. But NO MORE. As soon as SNW is done, I am cancelling until there is something to watch.
Shame on me for believing Paramount+ gave a thin strip about Star Trek. They only care about the $$$. Well, me too. No loyalty when they pull the show in two days and leave us hanging to “shop it out”. Well I’m shopping too.
Shame on CFO Naveen K. Chopra. Shame on Paramount Global. The Blessed Exchequer will measure your greed.
TrekHawaii Out….
Well guess what, these assholes already took it away. Since I thought I had until TUESDAY, I was going to watch at least a few of my favorite episodes one last time. Went to look for the show to watch only to discover it’s now gone.
Seriously Paramount can go fuck itself! I’m really upset I’m already paid up for the year now because I would cancel the second Lower Decks was done.
We all are. They wasted absolutely no time at all. All of these companies like P+ and MAX and whomever else cutting content and removing past content and thinking they are going to change MORE for their services are out of their minds if they think they are going to get away with it. My subscription is done after SNW is done in a few weeks.
You’d think they’d have the decency to drop the Prodigy advertising, at least.
I apologize in advance if the show doesn’t take arbitrary listener questions from these comments, and because my question isn’t related to this episode or to any contemporary Trek content, but as a listener this seemed like the best venue I could find to pose it. I’m afraid I can’t recall if listener questions have been addressed in the handful of episodes I’ve listened to in the past year or so of subscribing.
I’ve been watching Voyager in its entirety and have been appreciating Majel Barrett’s recordings as the ship’s computer’s voice. It made me wonder, with some newer questions arising during the current writers – and now actors – strike regarding the use of AI for things like movie extras: would it be acceptable, palatable, or desirable to the ST community to synthesize Barrett’s voice for use as ships’ computers in future Trek content? Assuming, say, her estate (if existent) endorses it. Do some think that such synthesis would be unnecessarily denying another voice actor the opportunity to contribute and earn? Is it too slippery of a slope to introduce to the franchise? Can studios be trusted to use it in a measured form?
In my mind, it would be a nice ongoing monument, but I suppose at some point it could be exhausted. I also worry that it might be a monument to a limited aspect of Barrett’s skill and contribution to the franchise, ignoring or de-emphasizing her role as Lwaxana Troi.
Thanks for publishing the show. It’s been a nice companion as I (re)experience older and contemporary Trek content.