Seems pretty clear-cut to me. TNG may have been the favorite back in the day, but a *lot* of people feel DS9 has aged better. That's worth something to the studios, whether they realize it or not.
And this is why it's up to us to make it clear how much demand there may well be for this series. And of course, the obvious metric being evaluated by CBS is sales of TNG blu (already mentioned upthread) Well I have been doing my part and can only look forward to more Trek on blu. iTunes, Netflix, etc. don't personally interest me but they're obvious outlets for these HD remasters as well. Has there been any announced plans of returning TNG to HD syndication? Or is there an assumption that this would only happen after all 7 seasons are complete? TNG season 5 and Unification pre-ordered, waiting on word of ENT season 3 (which I'm largely enjoying rewatching) and can't wait for any concrete info on DS9. I'm sure most here are already aware, but I did re-read this article recently which may lead to more optimism and an answer to those concerned about the increasing use of CGI. Trekcore Article
Here's the thing... If you randomly poll non-Trek fans, or even the casual ones who might've caught one of the recent movies, nearly all of them will be able to tell you who Kirk and Spock are. A good many of them will be able to tell you who Picard and Data are, given how mainstream TNG was in the 90's. I doubt very many at all will be able to tell you who Sisko and Dax are. It's sad, but that's a reality of it and couple that with a higher cost of remastering all this stuff given how much more effects DS9 used, I'm sure that's going to factor into their decision.
It's funny how it is always DS9 fans starting these topics, while VOY fans don't give a crap about whether their show is remastered or not. I heard VOY dvd sales were pretty awful too!
I doubt that blu-ray sales are as big a factor as some people think. The way I see it if CBS wants to keep making money off of Star Trek not just from home media but also streaming, syndication, and what ever else the future holds then they need to "Future-Proof" the entire Star Trek catalog by remastering everything because at some point HD will be the normal accepted format and SD will be considerably less valuable.
That's it exactly. The studio is looking at the big picture, not just BD sales. They want to continue to milk money out of these properties. DS9's remaster is virtually assured, as is VOY's. Yes, there's more CGI in those series than there was in TNG, but the restoration teams have probably learned by doing TNG how to do things even more efficiently and will apply what they learned to the other series to help cut costs and reduce the amount of time it takes. I imagine they're learning as they go and will learn from their mistakes as well as their successes how to make a DS9 remaster as efficient as possible.
VOY had some impressive FX, but I feel DS9 was far more visually interesting, especially on the standing sets, and that the show will benefit far more greatly from the HD treatment due to the often dark and higher contrast cinematography.
Well TNG-HD has been airing on the Syfy Channel (UK). There might also be some fans waiting for the boxset of all seasons to come out.
Of course it did. The good shows with low (comparatively) ratings always do. You'd think the studios would figure this out eventually.
But if you expect X show to shift 50 000 units and it shifts 70 000 it exceed you're expectations. Reverse it and it failed to meet expectations. So perhaps it all comes down to how well Paramount expected each show to sell.
Wow. I shudder to think how much a boxed set of 7 seasons on bluray would cost. I walked past a set of one season of TNG in Target the other day, and I had to do a double-take when I saw the price tag! But for some reason, I don't think I'd have the same reaction if I saw DS9 on bluray. I'd fork out the cash faster than you can say, "Dabo!"
ST:TNG Season 7 sold about 80,000 units during its first year in 2003 at the $100 Price point, generating about $8.3 million. I imagine the total is much more now. No other Trek series DVD was in the top 50 sellers for TV DVDs in 2003. X-Files wasn't there either. Buffy the Vampire Slayer dvd sets were huge that year. Season 5 sold twice as much units as TNG and made about as much money, but keep in mind the Buffy sets were cheaper. "Family Guy," "The Simpsons," "Friends," and "Sex and the City" sold even better.
In addition to the many ideas posted above, one thing worth doing might be to sign up on Amazon's mailing list for DS9 on Blu-ray and then write a review (currently there are only three) indicting your interest. Couldn't hurt. Thankfully, CBS seems to care more about the franchise on home video than Paramount does, so I'm personally optimistic.
Future-proofing is what it's about! Eventually we will move out of HD to Ultra HD, 4k, etc.. so if we leave Ds9 and Voyager in SD they really become more useless as time goes on.
I think they have got to at least put season 1 out there to feel out the demand, the problem is that they pretty much need to be working on 2 and 3 already to keep any flow in the releases. Blu Ray is a format with a shelf life, and they need to pull their fingers out or they will never get through everything before the time runs out!
I shelled out a 100 bucks a season back when the DVDs came out for TNG, DS9 and Voyager... out of the three, DS9 might be the only one I'd be interested in getting on bluray... and even then, I'd probably wait until there's a package deal.