Comment on "Star Trek is dying." How would you sell it to a younger audience?
themoken@startrek.website 1 week ago
Sorry, I don’t care what Kurtzman says about this (or an actor that is obliged to defend a project he was in) when it’s justifying putting out schlock for mind share. If that’s the best we can do, let it die - it doesn’t make anything that exists any worse.
Trek needs a good show that stands alone and isn’t aimed at us but a fresh audience. That means no cameos, limited references, not animated (that is a stigma as much as I love LD), and actually taking the time to get people invested.
Basically, they needed Discovery to not be garbage. I know non-Trekkies that were actually excited for a new sci-fi romp and got turned off almost immediately by the nonsense writing. Not the cast, or stupid out of universe concerns about being “woke” or some shit, just plain out “this makes no sense and isn’t fun to watch” and it was hard to disagree.
Everything since then has lived in Discovery’s shadow in terms of new audience and has mostly dealt with that by being aimed at fans of 90s Trek and nobody else. Prodigy may be an exception here, but that suffers from being oriented at kids.
data1701d@startrek.website 1 week ago
I agree in some senses with the stand-alone part, but not necessarily the animated part. I feel like it would just need to be marketed right. Executives are convinced for the most part that animation is either only for kids or for irreverent adult comedies, when it really should be viewed as a general medium.
I think Infinity Train is the best evidence of my point (look it up if you don’t know); it really transcends the typical bounds assigned to animation. Book 3 especially is truly just a great fantasy/sci-fi drama. However, it was basically killed by executives who wanted a tax write-off and couldn’t see its potential outside a “kids show”. Now some of the series is purchasable on various online storefronts, but the only legal way to watch all of Book 3 is to pirate it.
If executives and people alike would liberate themselves from the stigma of animation, I feel like you could pull off high-quality, TNG-length seasons that allow less rushed charater development for a reasonable budget compared to an expensive live action streaming show. In some ways, Prodigy was an example of this - I felt like I got more time with the characters than almost any other modern Trek (granted SNW is still going on).
I’ve never met a person where I mentioned Star Trek and they went, “Ew, Discovery. I’m never watching any Star Trek ever again”; I think Discovery had its flaws (and strengths), but it made little impact on franchise popularity.
Usually (which you touch on), it’s more like they’re just bamboozled by the cannon. Like, I was watching DS9 once, and my roommate asked if it was the original, which then brought a long and complicated explanation from me. I think you’re right that it’d be very nice to have a Star Trek show that one could show to people where when old lore is brought in, it’s delivered in such a way that people can pick it up as they go.
AlexisFR@jlai.lu 1 week ago
Is SNW even still a thing? We still have no date for S3 for nearly 2 years now.
data1701d@startrek.website 1 week ago
They’ve said it’s coming in early this year - there’s literally a clip of it out: m.youtube.com/watch?v=llvMv5-ydyQ&t=150s&pp=2AGWA…. It definitely looks near done.
Also, season 4 seems to already be in pre-production.
Keeponstalin@lemmy.world 1 week ago
Nice
themoken@startrek.website 1 week ago
Yes? It’s been renewed, and should premiere this year.
usernamefactory@lemmy.ca 1 week ago
Season 4 has been confirmed as well. It’s true that there was a longer gap between seasons 2 and 3, but that’s when the Hollywood strikes fell, so it’s not surprising.