For me it could go either way, but the advantage to doing episodic tales would be a greater variety of stories.
I think Doctor Who could be a great role model for a new Trek show. Have episodic stories with just enough serialization sprinkled in to spark the audiences interest and then have a big climax at the end of the season (please no major cliff hangers, though). Maybe even similar episode numbers, so they can keep the quality up, throw in a two parter or two and you are good to go. if a major conflict/war is the central theme, so be it, but not at the forefront and not series spanning.
Re: Αu Contraire! Except it doesn't. The novel continuity has veered away from anything that was on the air or in the prime universe movies. If you're a fan of that Star Trek and want to read about those crews and their adventures, you don't want to read the current novels. The crews have been broken up and redistribute to other ships and the there are brand new ships and many brand new characters that no one (other than current novel readers) have ever heard of. Most fans would have a better read with novels written over a dozen years ago prior to the ill-conceived "relaunch" philosophy.
Αu Contraire! Oh, really? I'm no movie mogul, but it's my understanding that the first movie was such a dog, that the studio didn't know what to do with it. That's why they kept moving the release date around so much. This is NEVER done with a movie a studio absolutely knows is a rock-solid, guaranteed hit. And ST: ID didn't do anywhere near the business they were hoping for. I saw both, only because I thought it'd be unfair to criticize them both without having actually seen them. They both stink on ice. Again, I'm no TV executive, but it's my understanding ENT was not cancelled because of low ratings, but it was cancelled because of the wrong kind of ratings. At that time, UPN was going for the "Twilight" (I guess what would now be called the "Hunger Games") crowd. But despite ENT's having a weird emo vibe about it -- like the opening tease cutting to black instead of fading, that horrible theme (with lyrics!!), etc., etc. -- it just wasn't catching on with that audience demographic. So UPN tossed ENT out of the nearest airlock despite fan protestations who were looking for any kind of Trek on TV. Besides, as any true Trek fan knows, ENT isn't really a Trek show. It didn't even have the bloody name "Star Trek" in it in the beginning!! But you said "... in [Trek's] final decade ...." ENT was only on for 4 years. So are you including almost the entirety of VOY in that assessment? I thought VOY was rather popular with the fans. Personally, it's my #2 after TOS. No: I absolutely believe a Prime Universe-based Trek TV show, with Rick Berman at the helm and picking up right where "Nemesis" leaves off, would do gangbuster business as far as ratings is concerned. Look, Berman did TNG/DS9/VOY, so he knows what he's doing. I'm sure he did ENT, for the aforementioned reasons, under duress, as it's just so at odds with the rest of his previous Trek efforts. We, the fans, are absolutely starving for such a show.
Re: Αu Contraire! You do realize that ratings started to slide with DS9 and that Enterprise was drawing less than two million viewers a week when cancelled? I'm sure not.
Re: Αu Contraire! I don't like the Abrams films, but there's absolutely no question they were two of the biggest hits in Trek movie history. There just isn't any arguing that point. Ratings were complete shit. TNG was the highest-rated syndicated drama during its entire run, scoring between 10 and 12 nearly every week. ENT was at the very bottom of the network barrel, with first-run episodes scoring ratings a fraction of TNG's rerun ratings. It wasn't catching on with any demographic. VOY's ratings were also shit. No, we aren't. EDIT: Here's a chart for you to show the relative box office scores of all the Trek films (except ID) and a chart showing the relative ratings of all the Trek spinoffs. Holy ratings-drop, Batman! EDIT2: Check out this list of TNG ratings and compare them to ENT's dismal numbers.
Re: Αu Contraire! As always you have to take into account the changing TV market, one of the reasons TNG commanded such ratings is that it had much less competition. There wasn't fifty plus other channels of content in most markets. Today, the three and a half to four million viewers Voyager was getting toward the end of it run would be considered pretty good for the average cable show. The ratings TOS was getting in it's third season would be out and out fantastic today.
Prime Trek I would have preferred they continued using the Prime timeline in the 25th century instead of doing Enterprise but without Berman at the helm.
Re: Αu Contraire! Sure there was. You're right, the TV landscape has changed over the last few decades, but that doesn't automatically account for all the lost numbers. TNG faced virtually no competition when it started, but in its later years faced a huge amount of competition in an oversaturated syndication market. The viewers stuck with the show all through its run, no matter the level of competition. The downward trend of the ratings happened the moment TNG went off the air.
Prime Trek Sorry for the late response. Absolutely no disrespect intended! I, quite literally, cannot express in words just how incredibly shocking both of those charts are! 1] ST2 wasn't a superduperblockbuster hit?!? They way it's constantly talked about, you'd think it was! I'm blown away by the fact that both ST4 & ST6 made substantially more money than ST2. 2] I'd always believed that the TNG movies were just a tad more popular with Trekkies: if only for being more shiny & modern & new and all of that. 3] Again, the DS9 & VOY ratings: just absolutely shocking. I thought the introduction of The Dominion War was what turned things around for what was otherwise a mediocre Trek show in DS9. It looks as if I was horribly wrong. And if VOY's ratings were so abyssmally bad, that makes me ask: how'd it manage to stay on the air for 7 years in the take-no-prisoners world of TV moneymaking? If I may, I'd like to posit an idea that may explain those charts. Look at the dates. Notice an inverse corellation between the advent of the internet & the box office/ratings drops? My theory: I don't think either the movies or the TV shows were doing so poorly as time went on because they were gradually losing interest/viewership for the Trekkies. No. What I think happened is that fan interest/(potential) viewership is as strong as ever. It's just that with stuff like Usenet, that thing before Kazaa whose name escapes & finally bit torrent, fans were using, um .... "alternate methods", let us say, to watch the movies/TV shows rather than going about it in the usual ways: like buying a ticket or watching TV and having it recorded by a Nielsen box. I don't think it has anything at all to do with "not being popular anymore". And in that recent "Spock Vs, Spock" TV car commercial, look who ends up having the upper hand at the end .... Why do you think the producers of that ad decided to go that way? Someone earlier said that "oldTrek" is only making money for a few convention promoters. Well, let's take the money the promoters make out of it just for a second. The fan interest that those conventions generate .... The passion that's always generated at these gatherings .... You're telling me that "oldTrek" isn't popular?!? And ask yourself this: if those JJ Abrams abominations are so hot, why is absolutely no one from those things ever the main attraction at a Trek convention, much less ever actually appearing at one, hmm? I don't recall ever seeing a Zack Quinto, or a Chris Pine or a Simon Pegg anywhere near a Star Trek convention, do you? A couple of years ago at a con, all 5 captains got together on the same stage. People where so moved by this, they were weeping openly. And this for a show that's "dead"? Your Honor, the defense rests. That's interesting. I don't agree, but it's interesting. lol Couple of questions: 1] What (I think you mean) 24th century storyline would you like the show to be about? 2] Why not Berman? 3] If not Berman, then who?
Re: Prime Trek I'm pretty sure all three have been at some Star Trek conventions, but I could be wrong. You seem to confuse something that has a very niche audience (conventions) with something that requires a very broad audience (TV shows). A TV show can't survive on a few thousand fans watching weekly. They can't really survive on the final numbers Enterprise was drawing and still have the large budgets that Star Trek series normally have.
Re: Prime Trek 1) The 24th century timeline would just be TNG, DS9, and Voyager (as well as ties to TOS, the Prime Universe). 2 and 3) Don't get me wrong, Berman had a good run but he had his time. Who should replace him? I don't know, but a new direction would have mixed it up like what they intended with Enterprise.
Re: Αu Contraire! This is pretty amazing that UPN was going after the Twilight fans as early as 2001, considering that the first novel in that series wasn't even published until about 5 months AFTER Enterprise went off the air in 2005.
Re: Αu Contraire! OK, "Twilight", whatever! lol You know perfectly well what I mean. Jeez, what's with all the primeTrek loathing around here? You'd think a board with the name "Trek BBS" would appreciate the wonderful gift Gene Roddenberry bestowed upon us ....
Re: Αu Contraire! No, I don't know perfectly well what you mean. Are you referring to ENT episode "Twilight", or the "Twilight" vampire novel and film series? I started with Star Trek in 1966, so I'm old school about it. But I don't know anything about the Twilight books or the Hunger Games books or their respective films. I'm an old person.
Re: Αu Contraire! Been a fan since 1975 and it's not "loathing", it's burn-out for me. I am ready for a new take, a new universe.
The novel & junk. And I do mean "junk". Sorry for the presumption. Suffice it to say that garbage is aimed at all of the thick-eyeglass frame-, sweater cuff over the wrist-wearing, ZERO musculature-having emo subhumans. You know: the group that ALL media is geared towards now? OK, sorry, sgain, for the presumption. My mistake. But, come on: what is it, exactly, that you're "burnt-out" on? Don't you miss Picard & Co.? I sure do .... Especially that in the aftermath of the debilitating Dominion War, the Fed's a much different animal now .... And you mention you want a "a new take"? Like what? Another TNG-esque jump forward, or something else entirely?
I've got 178 episodes and 4 movies featuring Picard and Company sitting on my shelf. So any time I "miss" them all I have to do is pop in a disc. Or read one of the dozens and dozens of novels that feature the characters. In order of preference... 1. An entirely new sci-fi space drama that has nothing to do with Star Trek, Battlestar Galactica, Stargate or any other series. 2. A TV reboot featuring Kirk and Spock. Even with the Abramsverse films they still have the least amount of screen time outside of Enterprise. 3. A movie series that features all new characters in a rebooted universe. I just have little desire to revisit the Berman-era series/characters.
I'm talking about new adventures. ??? I thought we were talking Trek. Oh, God no .... ENOUGH WITH THE REBOOTS. See above. lol ... and that's a real pity, it is. It's what makes Trek what it is now. I think you & I have nothing further to discuss, Sir. And by the way, no one's answered my question as to why, in the cutthroat world of TV ratings, if VOY was doing so poorly, it was kept on the air for SEVEN YEARS?