Mudang Harada
Lieutenant Commander
Talking about the HBO tv show of course. Do you think people would be more willing to risk a Trek tv show if is a massive hit?
How important is the success of Foundation for Trek?
- Thread starter Mudang Harada
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I think the success or failure of Bob Orci's Star Trek 3, or whatever it ends up being called, will be far more relevant to any future Trek projects than Foundation.
Mudang Harada
Lieutenant Commander
Yeah but the Trek sereis and movies are different animals.
Agreed. I don't think Foundation will have anything to do with whether there is a new Trek TV series or not. In fact, I think TPTB are just fine with Star Trek in the movies, only. I don't see any indication that anyone is in any hurry to get Trek back on the small screen at all.
But they are still part of the same brand. So I tend to agree that the success or failure of Star Trek 3 will be far more relevant to the possibilities of further Trek projects than Foundation.
I think there is a real possibility that Foundation will draw out sufficient scifi fans, enough for TPTB to seriously consider Trek for TV.
Possibly the box office success of the resent movies might be inhibiting the development of a new series. Why bother? The brand is bringing in cash.
Little to non, their is an audiance out there for ST already CBS knows this the longer it rests the more we want it. To draw an anology from my side of the pond DW was off the air virtually for 16 years and during that period the fans always wanted it to return. When the time is right they'll commission a new show
True, but the 'suits' tend to lack imagination. The reason TMP got made was due to Star Wars and they changed the phase two TV show into a movie. A hit sci-fi show on TV may be a push in the other direction...
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"Success has a thousand fathers but failure is an orphan."
I don't think it'll have much to do with developing a new Trek series. But THANK YOU for mentioning this because now I will have a new show to watch. 
"Success has a thousand fathers but failure is an orphan."
Cynical and pragmatic are two sides of the same coin sometimes.
The way most of the big movie studio's are thesedays, failure of a big budget movie can be catastrophic. A John Carter scale flop could have put a lesser studio than Disney out of business.
Copies of other studio's current successes, remakes/reboots of past 'hits' and sequels all offer a safer option. Give a studio a franchise and they'll run and run with it. Universal have only one reliable series, Fast and Furious. They nearly had a fit when Paul Walker died - Fast 7 will still only be two years after the last one.
Innovation and invention are risky. Imagination can be dangerous.
The difference between the Phase II/TMP situation, or indeed with any parallel to the way Doctor Who was off the air for a decade and a half in the 1990s, is that the suits always recognized Star Trek's brand potential in the Seventies, and had in fact been actively negotiating for it's return since about 1971. TAS was a by-product of that, but Phase II was the ultimate recognition of about five years worth of them trying to find a way to get Star Trek back out there -- and then Star Wars made them change gears and do a movie instead.
(By contrast, modern Trek is coasting along fine as a series of movies; and Doctor Who was treated like nothing more than an embassassment by the BBC for the better part of those 16 years it was off the air, it took outsiders with a vision to come in and try and jump start it again.)
Star Trek current state of affairs is more analogous to the way TNG came into being: the TOS movies were going from strength to strength, cultimating in the big picture hit that was Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home. This prompted the suits to wonder if Star Trek could work as a television property again, which was risky and untested waters at the time (having TV shows and movies co-existing at the same time, potentially splitting the audience). The parallel with Trek's current situation should be obvious.
I think that when the time is right, Star Trek will return to TV. After all, TV is really Star Trek's ancestral home, it's where the concept truly thrives, and we haven't really had a modern take on Star Trek on TV. But I don't think the suits will be willing to push that button until they're absolutely certain that the time is right for it, just like it was back in 1986.
(By contrast, modern Trek is coasting along fine as a series of movies; and Doctor Who was treated like nothing more than an embassassment by the BBC for the better part of those 16 years it was off the air, it took outsiders with a vision to come in and try and jump start it again.)
Star Trek current state of affairs is more analogous to the way TNG came into being: the TOS movies were going from strength to strength, cultimating in the big picture hit that was Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home. This prompted the suits to wonder if Star Trek could work as a television property again, which was risky and untested waters at the time (having TV shows and movies co-existing at the same time, potentially splitting the audience). The parallel with Trek's current situation should be obvious.
I think that when the time is right, Star Trek will return to TV. After all, TV is really Star Trek's ancestral home, it's where the concept truly thrives, and we haven't really had a modern take on Star Trek on TV. But I don't think the suits will be willing to push that button until they're absolutely certain that the time is right for it, just like it was back in 1986.
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