Anthony and Laurie covered the ‘Section 31’ junket and the NYC red carpet premiere, respectively, so this week they play the audio from their interviews and talk about what the cast and crew had to say, the fan reaction to Paramount +’s first streaming Star Trek movie, and more.
Links:
Interview: Michelle Yeoh Talks Georgiou’s Ongoing Redemption In ‘Star Trek: Section 31’
Interview: Sven Ruygrok Explains Fuzz’s ‘Star Trek: Section 31’ Species Backstory
Interview: Omari Hardwick On Alok’s Connection To Star Trek’s Dark History In ‘Section 31’
Interview: Carol Kane On The Adventure She’s Having In ‘Star Trek: Strange New Worlds’
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Thanks for reminding people there is nothing wrong with constructive criticism. I didn’t hate this movie as much as it seems like most people did but I have avoided most discussions regarding it because the vitriol is too high! I think it’s important to check our expectations at the door. The creative staff is going to make the movie THEY want to make. If we don’t like it…that’s ok but maybe others will. I also watched it with other people who don’t hate Star Trek but aren’t the fans that I am and they liked it. I wasn’t surprised by that as I think it was made for people who weren’t fans.
Hopefully going forward they continue to make these streaming movies but maybe think more about the audience you’re after. Then again that might depend on the budget. A niche fandom isn’t something the studio can afford to shell out a lot of money for. So maybe go smaller? Hard to tell at this point. I just don’t want all the negativity surrounding this to dissuade them from trying again.
Yep. The conversation has been unnecessarily vitriolic, whether it’s being mad at people who hate it or being mad at people who loved it. It’s nuts!
Everything these days seems to be high-stakes and vitriolic. Maybe it’s too much to suppose that the fandom of a TV space opera might be any different.
Totally agree. I personally hated it, but I can’t understand the dysfunctional types who actually get MAD at people for liking or disliking it. The gatekeeping is far too frequent in these boards.
Yes, I meant to mention that! There’s just as much anger at the people who DO like it as there is for the people who don’t… and assumptions galore about WHY they hate it or like it.
No pity required. You can discuss how they made a bad movie without objecting to their existence on this earth, that’s all.
Who said they must die? That sounds like an exaggeration to try to put down fans who are critical of the Kurtzman era. First they were racist, now they wish him dead?
Btw, that is the mind set that put Trump into the presidency of the world, and now, we have to suffer it again.
You dont like something?
Then you are a racist, rapist, and now it seems a mouder. Hell, that is why people turned to Trump.
And now WE suffer it, not you in the USA, but we, the small and poor countys of the world have to survive that bully.. again..
You don’t think that we’re suffering every hour having to live with that poster child for retroactive abortion back in power and abusing everything within reach?
The latest Pew Research Group poll would suggest not, at least not yet.
Give it a rest Harry/Emily/Marlpa. Your vitriol isn’t even bothersome anymore, it’s just…. tired and predictable. You aren’t making the points you think you are, and your constant need to antagonise and attack people who don’t share your point of view is, quite frankly, disturbing. I accept that you don’t like the current offering of Star Trek and that is totally valid, but I don’t accept your constant attempts to politicise any discussion and sling mud. At this point, I think you need to be banned outright. If you cannot have an intelligent and nuanced discussion, this site really is not for you.
That was over the top, man. Come down from that perch. This is a TV show with new showrunners, not Nazis seizing control of the U.S. government.
“Checking our expectations at the door” is the path to mediocrity in everything, not just Star Trek. You don’t get a participation trophy for producing awful, or even mediocre, work.
As far as Star Trek goes, there are plenty of other entertainment options out there, both science fiction and non-science fiction, and my time is finite. I’m going to watch content for which I have high expectations.
That’s up to you! I just think people should be realistic about the stuff studios produce. Not everything will be to everyone’s liking. Also knowing when to move on if you don’t like something is something every fan should know. What’s your limit? There is a way to be constructive and way to just be awful!
I am not directing anything at anyone personally I am just saying in general. I think most fans need to understand there is no need to keep being rude or upset about it. Some people seem to make a living just constantly bashing certain people or content. It clearly sales but I wonder why keep making it? Me I scroll past.
I myself used to get quite upset when a trek wasn’t what I wanted. When I leaned to let it go I found I could enjoy it more. I would rather use my time wisely rather than being miserable. If all else fails there is other Trek to watch. To each their own.
Everybody should listen to Rob Kazinsky`s interview with trekculture. He discusses his feelings on the negative reviews and other things as well. Very insightful stuff.
Agree. I heard part of it yesterday and plan to watch the rest today.
I did listen. He seems like a good guy. a good Star Trek fan, I even like his character for the 2 second that he lasted on screen and the bad writing he had.
He started saying that they have low budget. Ok, I can understend that.. but why? Why they have low budget? Kurtzman and Trekmovie keep saying us that Discovery was big success, same as SNW. and the rest.. why they have no budget then?
And btw, what budget have to do with bad writing? Do the writers charge you by the letter? I dont understend that.
Apart from the fact that the old series, as far as I know, were also low-budget productions… Nevertheless, they had good scripts.
It wasn’t low budget though. It was filmed in 4K unlike PIC season 3, which is 2K only.
The real problem of course is that it’s tonally deaf to what Star Trek is about. Star Trek isn’t about morally bankrupt people.
“The human race is a remarkable creature, one with great potential, and I hope that Star Trek has helped to show us what we can be if we believe in ourselves and our abilities.” –Gene Roddenberry
The 4K/2K issue is one of expense, but isn’t a massive expense, especially given the potential loss in revenue down the line. Shoot, as recently as s1 of KRYPTON, that series was getting finished only in HD quality (though presumably it was shot at higher rez), because TPTB at SyFy just cheaped out on post work, even though they had high-end vendors including DNEG and ILM.
TOS being low-budget is one of those inaccurate urban legends. The show had one of the highest budgets on TV at the time.
I heard the interview as well. I think people who are frustrated, myself included, are seeing this movie as the tail end of a nearly decade long frustration. This didn’t come out of nowhere. I don’t disagree with the argument that Trek could be dying, but I think mismanagement over a 20 year period is predominately to blame for that. Making not-Trek is not the solution. I have not seen any modern Trek that is the same caliber writing-wise, even production-wise, as the TNG era. I just don’t think these people have the chops. It’s like watching a guy try out for Varsity basketball when he can’t dribble. I’m sure Mr. Kurtzman is a nice guy, but he and his writing team should be doing something else.
This comment is spot-on. They’ve got the wrong leadership and the wrong writers.
Star Trek isn’t failing to attract a new generation of fans because it lacks enough kid shows, young adult show, legacy characters, animation, and workplace comedies. It’s failing to attract a new generation because it’s no good.
It does have its fans though! We shouldn’t act like Kurtzman and Co. have been terrible for everyone because they haven’t been. There are plenty of people who like Discovery, Lower Decks, Prodigy etc….I am not defending all of their actions, by the way, just trying to add some much needed balance to this discussion. We all want to see Star Trek have success! We just have different ideas about how to get there.
I personally tend to think Trek is a tough sell no matter who is in charge because it’s an aspirational show. Most people don’t want to watch a show about better times when they aren’t living like that! Also science fiction just isn’t to everyone’s liking.
Even if you enjoy it….can you afford to pay for it? Are you willing to pay for it? Its getting quite expensive. Most people are having to cut back on expenses and that’s one of the first ones to go. If Paramount were to license their content to other streaming services maybe there would be more fans? Who knows because they aren’t doing it!
Completely agree. TPTB keep searching for a mythical lost audience. Just hire great science fiction writers like TOS did and tell great stories. I fell in love with this format when I was 6 years old. Stop goosing around with gimmicks and nonsense and serving up swill and the audience will come.
I think the issue (for me) that that the old episodic format was demonstrably tired. It doesn’t fit in with today’s landscape and even in 2005, it got a Star Trek show cancelled. Enterprise (for me) is a tired, formulaic show with a terrible lead, reheated stories and nothing going for it besides being a prequel.
Ent was finding its feet by its third, fourth season as many post OS shows.
it was way better than Voy by the unfortunate early cancellation
The quality absolutely improved in Seasons 3 or 4 (though I’d argue Scott Bakula got worse)- but the ratings continued to nosedive. Star Trek’s episodic format had completely ran out of steam by that point and viewers were starting to embrace more serialised shows and narratives.
Let’s be honest though – at the time, certain fans were TOTALLY up in arms over the Temporal Cold War storyline somehow retroactively erasing canon or whatever. And they did the same with the alternate timeline of the KT movies, and the “prequel” seasons of Discovery.
“For once I wish they’d give us a post-Next Generation show!” they clamored. And they got multiple post-TNG shows, including Discovery post-time jump, Prodigy, and Lower Decks, and Picard, but they replied “No, not like that!”
And then it was “Can’t we explore the Lost Era?” and they got the Section 31 movie which takes place roughly around 2324-2326, and again it was “No, not like that.”
I mean TOS was a show with a bare minimum of continuity from week to week, with its share of clunker episodes and comedy bits, and before reruns, any canon was the equivalent of folk tales told by nomadic desert tribes, half-forgotten, half-remembered, and even the novelizations, such as they were, were not always given canonical status. Yet people treat it like it’s the US Constitution.
And TNG, VOY and DS9 had their clunker seasons and episodes as well (though rarer, for DS9, thankfully).
All of this to say that it’s normal to excuse things that we are familiar with, and resist that which is new.
40-60 years from now people will be saying “Remember when people were all up in arms over Section 31? What silly gooses they were.”
I don’t think that’s a very fair characterization.
Prodigy is a kids show, no shade against it, it’s just going to appeal to a very different audience.The same goes for Lower Decks, which is a cartoon. Discovery’s “time jump” came with all the baggage that came with prequel Discovery.
Picard is the the only live action example that is really applicable, and the first two seasons were completely out of character and tone from the era of Trek it was based on, even for all the darkness DS9 had, it was never like that. Season 3 still isn’t great, but it’s closer to the nostalgia trip that everyone had expected Picard to be from the beginning.
Discovery ended with little to no fanfare outside of some very, very loyal online communities. Almost zero cultural cachet, which ultimately is the biggest tell of the current state of the franchise.
Trek was always a bit niche (even when TNG was watched by tens of millions in syndication), but throwing these middling shows behind a paywall has been a huge misstep. I’m not sure I’d be worried about what people think of S31 in 40 to 60 years.
funny, at the time its numbers, demos were better than BSG
This is how I feel exactly. This isn’t a bad movie in the middle of a bunch of great content. It’s the culmination of nearly a decade of grim, awful, and most unforgivably stupid generic sci-fi wearing the Trek franchise as a skin suit
I can’t even watch these new shows and movies more than once but can watch the older stuff over and over again. The new shows try too hard to not be Star Trek and are certainly not prestige TV.
Agree with what most are saying in this thread. And I’m finding no rewatch value in SNW whatsoever, which isn’t much of a surprise. And, my P+ charge just showed up on my credit card bill this morning, almost $14 a month. I imagine paying Taylor Sheridan isn’t cheap.
I took advantage of their 50% off the yearly subscription last year but will be cancelling when that runs out. I won’t be subscribing again until there is new “Trek” I want to see, or they have another 50% off deal. It’s not worth paying more than that in my opinion.
Agreed. I have zero interest in rewatching Strange New Worlds. For all the talk about the show taking “big swings”, it’s alarmingly beige. A lot of the time, it feels terrified to say anything about anything that it ends up saying nothing.
I listened to this interview and I agreed with him about quite a few things. Sad he and others have been receiving negative comments that cross a line for THEM! He even said he tried to warn fans repeatedly. For what it was worth I heard him. Trek Movie even did an article about it. A lot of fans want to live in a Star Trek type world but unfortunately we can’t even seem to adhere to basic philosophical concepts like IDIC. We just attack and we don’t bother to listen to anyone anymore.
The fictional Vulcans don’t even adhere to the philosophical concepts of IDIC when it comes to belittling human emotions every chance they get and ostracizing emotional Vulcans within their own society.
Didn’t the very first episode of Discovery establish that the Vulcans “tolerate” Klingon intrusions into their space by immediately blowing them up and asking questions later?
IDIC — either as portrayed onscreen or however you might wish to map it onto your life in the real world — does not require that people agree for the sake of agreeing, or that they bury any criticism when warranted.
You seem to think the purpose of literary criticism is cheerleading. It is not.
There is a spectrum between thoughtful criticism and literally calling for the heads of people who produce content you don’t like. Or, maybe these days, there isn’t.
There is also such a thing as accountability. If an executive has demonstrably mismanaged a business project over and over again, should he be allowed to repeatedly fail upward?
This is no less true in Hollywood than elsewhere. Should Golan-Globus have been rewarded for SUPERMAN IV with another Superman movie?
Yes, and “accountability” falls well within the spectrum of reasonable discourse on any subject, let alone the management of a space opera franchise. If people feel that there are better alternatives to Kurtzmann and Co. they are perfectly entitled to say so. That doesn’t extend to personal attacks or (as in some extreme cases) wishing people ill, or worse. That’s literally the last thing the world needs in its current state, particularly coming from those who claim to want a brighter future.
I listened to most of it. It was kind of just the same old stuff, low budget, we need “different flavours” of Star Trek, young people don’t know what Star Trek is, Section 31 are important and we can’t possibly exist without them etc… I was amused at the comment about Star Trek fans being “better” than Star Wars fans. Don’t start a war, Rob. Oh, also his comment that Beyond had no limit on it’s runtime. Where’s that 9 hour version of Star Trek Beyond, then?
Here’s how I first discovered Star Trek. When I was in my first year of school (so 4 years old, 1993), our teacher set us home work one week on a Friday. The homework was: watch one episode (or more) of Star Trek: The Original Series.
No one went “EXCUSE ME MISS, THAT SHOW IS OLD”
Things that are good get passed on.
Oh yeah I listened to it too and not just the abbreviated version that’s up on Youtube but the nearly two hour version of it as well. I listened to it on a plane ride home. I didn’t plan to listen to the whole thing, just maybe the first hour but it was pretty riveting to say the least.
Kazinsky is obviously a huge fan and he saw all the pitfalls this movie had from the beginning. It’s obvious how much the reactions by the fans are bothering him but he also seems to agree with a lot of the issues being discussed but still try to say the movie isn’t that bad from a certain point of view, etc. It is really insightful even if I don’t agree with everything, it’s nice to hear someone’s honest POV who was directly part of it just the same.
And I understand the view about Kurtzman telling him the franchise is ‘dying’. I don’t think he meant that too literally but yeah a lot of us get what he is saying and the warning signs have been there for a long time now and the franchise is simply not expanding in a way it should. I been saying this forever now. We have a lot of new content but it’s really just being watched by everyone who watched it from the 60s-90s, when Trek was at its most active and popular. Today it just feels more niche than ever. Which is ironic because the Kelvin movies were meant to have the opposite effect and bring Trek to the masses like never before and yet those movies feel like a lifetime ago now.
And these shows just don’t seem to be grabbing a lot of new viewers. A year or two ago people were throwing phrases around like ‘market growers’ and supposedly expanding the base with a lot of young new viewers who was supposed to take the franchise into the next generation. That was probably the intent, but it’s obvious it’s been failing. The modern era went from five shows and having an episode on every week of the year at its peak to now 1-2 shows in production and this year will mark the least amount of new content in five years. The movie side has now languished to nearly a decade without a theatrical movie. There is no real merchandise for any of these new shows. If there were truly a lot of younger fans out there, that would be the main indicator but instead it’s just very expensive online collectibles these days aimed at the long time fans and no one else.
It’s the lack of merchandise I think that is really bothering Paramount because several decades ago that used to be a big part of this franchise revenue and got a lot of kids and teenagers (like me) to buy tons of it. Now that stuff doesn’t exist because they aren’t producing a lot of young people to watch or be that invested in it.
I don’t think Trek is going anywhere anytime soon but it hasn’t reached younger demographics in years, so they are trying ways to attract people who just doesn’t care about stuff like Discovery, Picard or even SNW. But I don’t believe Section 31 is the way to go either. It’s been pointed out the movie is a big hit on Paramount+ which is good but I still believe the overwhelming majority who watch it are old fans. Judging by how badly it’s been rated everywhere, that seems to be the case. Again, people can spin it all day long, but then look at how high the ratings are for the Kelvin movies to this day. Even though they seem very divided in the fanbase itself, the high ratings came from all the new viewers, so those movies popularity bares out. But as Kazinsky said, it still wasn’t enough of them to make them a hit. But that is still not happening in Section 31 case meaning it’s either still not a lot of new people watching or most just think it sucks as much as old fans do.
Kazinsky raised a lot of good points, but he also admitted he didn’t like the movie when he first watched it either and he gave a lot of reasons why it turned out the way it did and some of the issues were simply out of their hands. But same time, when you make something that basically looks or acts nothing like the property you’re supposed to be represented, I just don’t understand how that benefits new fans because it just feels like a very generic movie and captures literally nothing that makes Star Trek special in the first place.
It certainly shows the current state of the franchise in the overall culture, doesn’t it? Where are the kid’s Halloween costumes? Kids toys? Where’s all the Trek-branded content that isn’t based on pre-2005 properties?
They chased a mythical “new” fan base, but what I see is just a smaller and smaller number of older fans that have been around for decades and still tune into the new stuff. I’m sure there’s some small percentage of people who never watched Trek before 2017 (or 2009) who are now hooked, but it was at the expensive of a bigger demographic that no longer tunes in, no longer purchases merchandise, and no longer cares about Trek at all.
That seems to jive up as almost all of the modern franchise is geared towards adults. I grew up watching old TOS episodes and the TOS movies as a kid. I saw ST:V in the theaters as a ~6 year old. I was ~9 when DS9 aired. A lot of the episode themes were geared towards adults, but they were accessible to kids of almost all ages. That doesn’t exist anymore. The “kids” get Prodigy. My kid is about the same age a I was when I started watching Trek and I don’t think I’d sit him down to watch anything produced for the franchise in the last 20 years.
In the interests of balance in this full on put down of Section 31, I feel compelled to put up another opinion; please don’t troll me about having one. I’ve read all the critics and I agree that Section 31 is no First Contact or Wrath of Kahn but in the end, after watching it twice, I enjoyed it! Initially I needed to get my head around the change of direction but once I did, I settled into it. I find with any Star Trek TV or Movies, if I am compelled to watch them more then once, then I have enjoyed it.
I am a granddad of Star Trek getting to enjoy first run episodes since the 60s. It amazes me how passionate haters some ‘fans’ can be. Next Gen got a similar level of level of vitriol to 31 when it started, so did DS9 and lets not forget Enterprise; where people even bitched about the intro song for 2 years or more! Now ALL those shows are revered!
I loved Disco and it’s season long themes as I did most of Picard – season 2 was a bit of a stretch ;). LD was a hoot and Prodigy was just great! Whilst I’m enjoying SNW, I find the attempts to try and cover all bases has tended to make the show more comic book for me, but I still enjoy it. In between all this new stuff, I revisit Next Gen regularly.
Bottom line for me, I understand what Kurtzman and Co, and even JJ, are doing trying to expand the franchise and I thank them for that. “Life is like a box of chocolates” as heralded by that great American philosopher, F. Gump. You never know what you are going to get with Star Trek. But like that fabled box of chocolates, I thank the legions of creative people who try to bring us new flavours. Keep them coming!
Sounds like you’re about 10 years older than I am, Cheers to that. As for sitting through Sec. 31 Twice…you’re a better man than I, and you’re a very forgiving long-time fan. LLAP.
I’m also happy you enjoyed it Kevin! You generally have a very positive attitude about the franchise in general and it’s nice to see you got something out of this movie.
Unfortunately I had the opposite reaction to it. I just thought it was generally bad and I think a lot of people feel that way for valid reasons. And I don’t think it’s just people looking to ‘hate’ Kurtzman or even NuTrek in general because up until now, the fanbase has been generally happy with most of the content the last few years.
That’s always this big disconnect I see on these boards time and time again. Fans don’t like something and (naturally) point it out and it’s deemed as people just looking to hate on everything. But they then constantly ignore all the positive goodwill people do give time and time again. Picard season 3, Prodigy seasons 1 and 2, Lower Decks seasons 4 and 5 and SNW 1 and (yes) 2 have all been given generally positive praise the last several years. Even Discovery season 5 was viewed more positively than the last few seasons, certainly season 4 lol. Yeah still nothing close to a home run by many but it wasn’t all vitriol with that season either.
And yes, I’m obviously not saying everyone loved all of that and people had issues with some of it as well. I don’t even love all of it and I admit while I liked SNW season 2 and LDS season 5, both were more of a let down from their previous seasons, but I still liked them. And on the flip side, I liked Discovery final season more than I thought I would. I think a lot of people did even if others still though ir sucked. But again, fans only seems to focus on when people are complaining about something, but miss when they are genuinely excited about something as well.
IMO, it’s been a few great years for Star Trek. I have loved stuff like Picard season 3, SNW, LDS and Prodigy just as much as I loved a lot of the old shows. In some cases, like Prodigy, even more at times.
But yeah, sadly this movie took those positive vibes waaay down for me. The high I felt with the last few episodes of LDS season 5 came crashing down with this. And yeah, you’re right, a lot of the old stuff was hated on at first and became beloved later. But people still hate movies like TFF and Nemesis to this day as well. A lot of old Trek has aged beautifully today like Enterprise for example, but some of it is still seen just as bad when it first premiered and it’s mostly the films incidentally.
And I don’t think most people have an issue when they try to do something new or out of their comfort zone, again see Lower Decks. It’s just when it’s not very good when it’s the problem. And as I point out with this movie, it’s not that it’s ‘different’ so much that it’s basically unrecognizable to the property it’s suppose to be representing. One glaring example of that are the ‘tricorders’ in the movie. They were just modified present day smartphones instead of actual 24th century tricorders. Why??? That’s just a weird choice in a long list of them of how they only made this movie feel more generic than anything.
So again, your points are valid, but some things will just be considered bad because most fans simply think they’re bad because frankly of the many questionable choices they made in it. But most fans aren’t just looking to hate everything either, quite the opposite. This movie is seen as legitimately bad for many reasons, but it doesn’t mean everyone feels that way like yourself or that everything since 2017 has been a complete waste either no matter how many NuTrek detractors make videos about it on YouTube.
So listening to the podcast and hearing Alex Kurtzman speak about this, as opposed ot just reading, gave a little context I didn’t get. First.. kudos to both Anthony and Laurie for asking tough questions, without putting any shred of vitriol. But something about hearing him speak about it really just underscored and reinforced that he has a very shallow and myopic view of what Trek is… and dare I say… a negative view. He speaks about Roddenberry’s vision as if that’s been established and reinforced in his iteration of Trek. With Section 31, he basically goes down the checklist of things they wanted in it.. humor, action, etc… but he forgot heart. The second thing is how obvious it is that he’s trying to start everything he can under his umbrella to prolong Secret Hideout’s involvement as long as he can until Skydance shows up. If he’s got Season 2 of Academy underway, the less likely it’ll be to get cancelled. He’s scared, and the reception of this film isn’t going to ease any concerns he may have. The next year is going to be very interesting for Trek.
s31?
better luck next time….
Say whatever you want, make whatever version of Star Trek you want but the fact that Kurtzman believes that you cannot have the Federation without Section 31 tells me he doesn’t understand the underlying philosophy that made Star Trek “Star Trek”.
Simply put, that humanity can progress and prosper without resorting to our worst impulses and most basic instincts. Not that we’re perfect, but to quote Captain Kirk:
We’re human beings with the blood of a million savage years on our hands, but we can stop it! We can admit that we’re killers, but we’re not going to kill today. That’s all it takes, knowing that we’re not going to kill – today!
I listened to Kurtzman’s interview in the opening and while I don’t disagree too much with his basic stance and what Section 31 represents in Star Trek, the problem is none of that is discussed in the actual film. It’s very frustrating to me that he spends a lot of time giving flowery and pointed answers about how much this group is a mirror to Federation values etc, but then none of that Is ever highlighted between any of the characters. The closest we get to it is Rachel Garret saying (constantly) she’s there to make sure Section 31 plays by Starfleet rules and nothing more.
I have the exact same frustrations over Georgiou. It’s never really discussed all the cruel and evil things she’s done. You have Space Hitler as part of this group that defies everything the Federation is suppose to represent and no one seems remotely bothered by who she is or the fact the genocide Mcguffin weapon they are chasing down is because she help create it. If this was made for ‘new’ fans it would seem like this is the time to talk why this character and group in general is so antithetical in Star Trek but why they are both there. But she was in three seasons of Discovery and we never got one scene, one, where she was either challenged or that she had some introspection of who she is and what she has done. But watching this movie as a first time Trek viewer, you would never know this group or even Georgiou was supposed to even be controversial within the universe itself and just given the notion Starfleet just uses ‘flawed’ people like this all the time.
Because instead, we get very lame jokes and one liners, lots of action and everyone just acting like it’s just another day at the office. My only guess is Kurtzman was told to keep this light and fluffy, don’t go too ‘cerebral’ with it and just treat it as Suicide Squad in space instead actually highlighting all the things he talked about in this interview. This movie is getting slammed for many many valid reasons, but for me personally because they completely skip over every issue with the concept. You could’ve called them anything else and it wouldn’t have mattered because sadly Section 31 feels like that in name only and not a direct interpretation of the group or given any introspection about anything.
I thought that the movie had some interesting ideas – a 350 year old Augment, a nano species that was older than the dinosaurs, a campaign by the Terran Empire to invade the Prime Universe, but it was obviously all meant to be explored in a much more comprehensive way than whittled down into a 90 minute movie, not that it could not have been effectively explored as a movie.
The tone that they took for the story, a jokey Guardian of the Galaxy approach, did not work at all. As you note, it evaporated the dramatic impact of the characters, and the attempts at humor were off-key and ineffective. I wanted to know more about the history of the augment guy and the Nanokins and the obscene and brutal emperor selection process of the Terran Empire. Instead we got lame jokes.
Tiger, I agree with you on a lot of what you have said (as often seems to happen). It’s nice that Anthony and Laurie notice and mention that Kurtzman always “says the right stuff”, but my take on it is that over the 6-8 years (I forget when Kurtzman came on) that he has been involved in producing Trek for this modern era, he has learned what all the correct verbiage is to talk about Trek. When it comes down to implementing all the right stuff in Trek, he doesn’t as often succeed. In fact, his biggest successes, in my mind, are when he hires good creators and allows them to make good Trek: Matalas (though PIC s3 is a mixed bag in some ways, it does a lot right, and better than S1-S2), the Hagemans, McMahon, and largely Goldsman. Which is not all that different from the Berman-era Trek and DS9. It seems like all the projects where Kurtzman is more involved are more riddled with issues. [Now I don’t have insider knowledge or even as good of an understanding about how the various Trek productions are produced, so maybe I am off base about this whole thing and Anthony and Laurie certainly have a better understanding of the production side of things.]
Now some of the hiccups of the modern Trek era stem from (again: in my opinion) from the early-going production team at large misunderstanding 1) how to really make a Trek production, and 2) a focus on “doing things differently” rather than on good storytelling. Some of those issues have been ironed out over the years, but clearly some are still hanging around. Kurtzman basically talks a big talk about what he wants or even intends to put in Trek, but is still beholden to the “production realities” like getting the S31 “thing” produced with a bad concept and bad implementation just because they had Yeoh onboard now; or not pursuing Legacy (which seems like a critical and financial home run) because of whatever the heck is going on at Paramount corporate.
It’s not all on Kurtzman. He doesn’t seem to be as powerful as Berman was back in the day; and Berman had the direct connection to Roddenberry as his effective heir. Kurtzman may be unable and/or unwilling to draw the line about what should be in Trek; too willing to pursue the “cool” stuff to try to keep Trek profitable and relevant than to actively pursue good art over “product.” As misguided as Berman was in many ways (diversity in storytelling approaches, representation, [IDIC!!], serialization) I think he really did try to stick to the “Roddenberry rules” about what Trek should be, and despite (or maybe because of) the mandate to produce 24-26 episodes per show per year, managed to often turn out very good Trek and very good sci-fi. Would it be such a fantasy for someone like Kurtzman to say “no, we are going to pursue what is good Trek, not what feels “edgy” and “cool” ” even at the cost of his own firing? I would never wish for less Trek overall, but would it be so bad if Kurtzman “sacrificed” himself to produce a season or 3 of “amazing” Trek (a kind of “Freaks and Geeks” situation)?
Thinking about it “big picture,” a lot of the failures of Kurtzman-era Trek mirror those shallow production (I hesitate to call them “creative”) decisions of the late VOY/ENT years which tried to put sex appeal, edgy militarism, and counterterrorism elements in Trek instead of just focusing on good stories and good sci-fi. And season 4 of ENT felt like S3 of PIC – a successful attempt to make the show like what it should have been from the start – only to have it be unappreciated by The Powers That Be. Other than adding Worf and the Defiant to DS9, I can’t really think of any time where TNG or DS9 went with “let’s add X element, cause that is what the cool kids will like.” They seemed more interested in just telling good stories and content with letting an audience come to them. But maybe it only seems that way because DS9’s efforts at serialization seem like the right call now, but in another universe could have been big failures and seen as cynical attempts to do what the “cool” kids would like. And maybe those shows had the luxury of not having to try to cater to an imaginary audience, because they were produced during an era where Trek was thriving and was (relatively) “it” in the culture.
I just watched the interview with Robert Kazinsky on Trek Culture. Its interesting because he says Star Trek is in decline and needs new ‘flavours’ to draw in more fans. And section 31 had to have loud music and lots of violence etc.. to try and draw them in.
I think he’s wrong. But it’s a fascinating interview. And I feel really bad for him because in his interview, he shows that he’s a really trekkie and you can tell he’s hurting at the savage reviews.
And yet the new flavor of Section 31 seems to have only drawn in bad reviews.
If Star Trek is truly in decline, then I am pretty certain turning it into other genres/flavors is only going to hurt it more than save it.
I still think bad creative decisions, like grossly turning away from the source material to chase an audience that will never be interested in it, is doing the most damage.
I had the same reaction. He has so much passion about Trek, but I think he is like 80% wrong. It think it is a major misconception that Trek “needs” that stuff.
As for the “Trek is dying” idea: I think, despite any “numbers” Paramount may have about the number of eyeballs on Trek now, that they are wrong too. If Paramount wants to pursue making $200 million dollar movies and $100+ million dollar seasons of mediocre but flashy television (I’m looking at you STID and Disco), then yeah, the audience is not there for that and never has been. For about 1 minute in 1977 The Power That Be had the dream that Trek could be a top tier franchise capable of supporting such numbers. Star Wars fed that brief dream and Star Trek The Motion Picture was the result. TBTB revived that dream in 2009 for JJ’s Star Trek, but that died with the now second-worst Trek movie of STID. Everything else we have ever seen about Trek is that while it may be frequently beloved, occasionally makes a big splash in culture, sometimes feels to us fans like it is top tier pop culture, and occasionally makes a bunch of money, it should not be treated and funded like the biggest thing in pop culture. Make high-quality science fiction with memorable characters and the humanistic Roddenberry spirit, but make it at a reasonable budget for a reasonable audience, and you will have a franchise that last for not just 60 years but 160 years.
60 years of fans and quality sci-fi does not go away if you stop pouring unsupportable amounts of money into new editions. Seems straight forward to me. But The Power That Be never seem to get this understanding and instead constantly pursue and fail to achieve the pop culture crown. Not unlike movie making in Hollywood overall right now; no room for the mid-budget product.
Thank you very much TrekMovie for your coverage of this new format for Star Trek.
I’m curious if you’ve ever invited individuals from the “mainstream” audience, in addition to the “fanbase” audience, to participate in your podcast?
I ask this because I’ve heard favorable comments about Section 31 from “mainstream” folks who enjoyed the movie: had some popcorn, snapped some beer cans, ordered some delivery food, and so forth.
My “fanbase” friends have commented about Section 31 mostly in a complacent manner, almost to the point that they’ve given up on Star Trek altogether.
Has the “fanbase” audience turned “fanatical”?
How do you define the “mainstream” audience vs the “fanbase” audience?
For example, Merriam-Webster:
fanbase – “a group of fans for a particular sport, musical group, celebrity, book or film franchise, etc.”
mainstream – “the ideas, attitudes, or activities that are regarded as normal or conventional; the dominant trend in opinion, fashion, or the arts”
Well… we are a Star Trek podcast on a Star Trek site, so that is the lens through which we watch, discuss, celebrate, and critique.
Understood. It’s a great podcast!
As a longtime Star Trek fan, I’ve personally always found it refreshing to keep an open mind to comments by non-fans who watch Star Trek casually…
Keep up the extraordinary work!
Thanks! And we are always open to comments by anyone. (That just doesn’t mean they are invited onto the podcast.)
So I finally got to watch Section 31 last night. Given the negative reviews I went in with absolutely no expectations.
Imagine my surprise when I actually ended up liking it. The film did not take itself seriously at all, and it was just mindless fun.
Sure, it did not feel like Star Trek at all, but still, I really liked it. Not sure what else there is to say, except that if there is a sequel I will be on board for it.