The passion is there; it's just a different kind of passion. There's a bit of a difference between the older production personnel being involved in a remaster of Roddenberry and Berman-era Trek, and new people actively producing new shows. For example, LDS isn't my cup of tea because I think a lot of it is juvenile and I don't actually find it funny, but there's no doubt that Mike McMahon had a huge passion about making it.
The reason DS9 and Voyager haven't been remastered is because Paramount doesn't think they would get enough of a return on the investment. Passion simply doesn't come into it.
Yeah, I really don’t see a lot of people rushing out to buy seven seasons worth of DS9 or VOY Blu-rays. If anything, people will probably wait to watch DS9-R and VOY-R on P+ or some other streamer. That’s what I did with TOS-R. There’s just not enough incentive for CBS to do that project. Perhaps it would have worked back when TOS got remastered, but that ship has sailed.
For me, DS9 yes, VOY no. However, VOY has seen something of a resurrection (albeit briefly) with Prodigy being basically its series continuation, and the return of 7-of-9 in PIC, but I don't see the momentum continuing considering they're basically ending damn near everything.
Yes, I doubt that physical media sales would even factor into the decision. The only hope is that Paramount commission it as an exclusive for P+. There is some precedent - the 4K remaster of the TMP Director's Edition was initially a P+ exclusive. But that's just one movie. The upfront investment to remaster 350 episodes would be huge, and it would be difficult to argue it would lead to an uptick in subscribers. The argument would be that TNG-R didn't meet sales projections and the target audience are already subscribed to watch the other Trek shows. Maybe there's a ray of light that a remaster would still be cheaper than producing new shows, and therefore it would be a cost effective way to ensure more Trekkies keep their subs between seasons of SNW. But with the impending takeover, does anyone think Paramount+ will even be here next year?
Nope. And I have a feeling SFA ultimately won't be happening. But on the plus side, there might actually be a theatrical film if Skydance is involved, rather than the eight years of bullshit Paramount has been rumormongering to keep their investors happy.
Paramount's starting to give Alec Peters a run for his money when it comes to Trek projects that get announced but never see the light of day. Not a good look.
Not sure the SFA idea is necessarily the new Trek that the fandom is clamoring for, but I'll give it a shot. It kind of feels like they're really running low on new ideas though. The SFA concept goes back as far as Harve Bennett's pitch for Star Trek VI, IIRC, maybe even older.
Planning out sets? I thought they were going to use DSC assets. That was the whole point of making the show in the 32nd century.
VGR used the same sets as TNG, which used the same sets as the first four movies, but they still, you know, did stuff to them. I doubt the whole thing is just going to take place as-is on the Discovery, or a suspiciously similar ship.
That was speculation, not confirmed by anyone from production. They're building a set that's taking up the entirety of largest sound stage at Pinewood Toronto. Which AFAIK is the largest sound stage in North America. Which would make it the biggest Trek set in history https://variety.com/2024/tv/feature...-academy-section-31-michelle-yeoh-1235952301/ "In one of Kurtzman’s several production offices in Toronto, he and production designer Matthew Davies are scrutinizing a series of concept drawings for the newest “Star Trek” show, “Starfleet Academy.” A bit earlier, they showed me their plans for the series’ central academic atrium, a sprawling, two-story structure that will include a mess hall, amphitheater, trees, catwalks, multiple classrooms and a striking view of the Golden Gate Bridge in a single, contiguous space. To fit it all, they plan to use every inch of Pinewood Toronto’s 45,900 square foot soundstage, the largest in Canada."
So if Starfleet Academy is on Earth here that suggests it might not be 32nd century... unless they moved the Academy back there very quickly after Earth rejoins the Federation.
Sets have been built and ultimately not used before (or refurbished to be used for an entirely different production.) Remember Phase II?
What I would say is that designing the Starfleet Academy set and building it are two different things. “Concept drawings” sounds very pre-production.
That could very well be the case, IMO. In "Kobayashi Maru," it was said more than once that the Academy was "reopening." Perhaps they are referring to the original main campus in San Francisco, which may have been resigned to being a historical landmark after Starflleet relocated from Earth.