Will they go back to primeTrek after nuTrek finishes?.

[Darren Mooney]

Is that really true? I thought they were always trying to get the general audience. They always actioned up the movies compared to the TV show. And they did the Kirk meeting Picard plot that seems popular to the general audience. Then there are things they didn't do which fans might have wanted, such as Voyager having continuity and Nemesis / Enterprise not sucking. And those ideas probably aren't unappealing to the general audience either.

But did they go too far in those regards, sure you want to appeal to a wide an audiance as possible, but at the same time you don't want to alienate your core audiance, if your core audiance is critising a show/film that might rub off on the more general audiance, if even the fans don't like it then it's unlikely I will.

I feel like those shows did plenty of pandering to those who weren't fans. Tsunkatse anyone?

And seriously, at one time there was a fan base of like 20 million watching TNG. Most of those fans left because it just wasn't as entertaining, not because there was fan pandering. The only real pandering probably happened in the 4th season of Enterprise, and by then, the prime timeline was already screwed.

Tsunkatse pandered to a different fan base not to a broader audience. And it was the exception, not the rule.

What did Voyager actually do to grow the fanbase? The Next Generation was a pretty cutting age show for the late eighties. However, Voyager just kept fetishing that model of storytelling into the twenty-first century. It added a sexually objectified female character, but that was pandering to what it perceived to be the target market - nerds who like boobs. I love Jeri Ryan's performance, and like her character arc, but the addition of Seven as the new focus character was the point at which it was clear this was not a show that saw itself aiming towards a broad audience, but towards shut-ins who think "sexy" is a painted-on catsuit.

(Whatever about the infamous "male gaze" scene in Into Darkness, it was a single short scene, and had an accompanying "female gaze" scene with Khan in the shower that was unfortunately cut.)

By the time that the first two seasons of Enterprise had committed to doing "what TNG had defined as Star Trek stuff" with "awkward sexy stuff because nerds like boob, right?", the franchise was terminal.

 

[Mudd]

TNG's viewership might have reached 17 or 18 million for one single episode at some point, but it generally was in the 12-13 million range at its height of popularity. Not shabby.

It wasn't so much a "cutting edge show" in terms of content - look to network dramas like Bochco's for that - but it was a very novel show. There was nothing else like it.

 

[Greg Cox]

According to this wiki the village in the movies was supposed to be in Switzerland per the shooting script for the first one, and is finally referred to as Frankenstein village in the third movie.

As for changing names, I think I was confused by the fact that Ghost Of Frankenstein relocates the familiar plot to another town, Vasaria, where Ygor flees with the monster.

What part of England was that very strange little town Lawrence Talbot hailed from?

In retrospect, given that Frankenstein would have been working mainly with Swiss corpses it's terribly offensive that they cast some tall British twit to play the Monster in 1931, and even more unforgivable that they recast with some Hungarian ham for Frankenstein Meets the Wolfman.

The first Wolfman movie takes place in Wales, actually, but Talbot relocates to Europe when he goes in search of Doctor Frankenstein in the sequel.

How exactly he gets from Wales to Europe in a horse-drawn gypsy wagon remains a mystery . ...

(P.S. You're forgetting the hulking American playing the Monster inbetween the Brit and the Hungarian.)

 

[urbandefault]

(P.S. You're forgetting the hulking American playing the Monster inbetween the Brit and the Hungarian.)

How many different versions of the Monster have there been? Which one (other than Karloff) was the best?

That might be good for a poll, and an interesting topic of discussion.

 

[Mudd]

In the Prime Frankenstein Universe, ie the movies that are part of the original Universal continuity, the Monster was played by:

Boris Karloff
Lon Chaney, Jr.
Bela Lugosi
Glenn Strange

Strange's version is probably seen in merchandise and publication as often if not more often than Karloff's, but people seem usually to think they're looking at Karloff. The look of Herman Munster, for example, is derived pretty directly from Strange.

 

[Kemaiku]

You could also simply call him Adam Frankenstein, it is his name afterall.

 

[Nerys Myk]

Creating a product without customer input, and maintaining a product line without customer input are two very different things.

And they do always give their target audience what it wants. They would be crazy if they didn't.

If you don't give a fan what the fan wants, then that fan simply does not belong to your target audience.

The entertainment industry looks to things like revenue not fan focus groups. That's the "input" that matters.

 

[Greg Cox]

You could also simply call him Adam Frankenstein, it is his name afterall.

But he's never called that in the Universal movies.

Heck, the original movies changed Dr. Frankenstein's name from "Victor" to "Henry."

And I've read that when Karloff died, some papers ran photos of Strange as the Monster by mistake.

And then, of course, there was a later series of Hammer FRANKENSTEIN movies starring Peter Cushing as the doctor, creating a different monster in each film!

 

[Mudd]

If you don't give a fan what the fan wants, then that fan simply does not belong to your target audience.

A lot of hard core Trek fans don't belong to Star Trek's target audience.

 

[Kemaiku]

You could also simply call him Adam Frankenstein, it is his name afterall.

But he's never called that in the Universal movies.

I know, but he is in the novel and the 2013 movie.

I'm interested to see what Universal's Combined Monster Universe series calls him, or who they get to play him, around 2017-18.

Heh, Van Helsing (2004) and the CMU for Universal Monsters both have drastically different reboot origins for all of them, while we're on the topic of re-imaging.

 

[martok2112]

If you don't give a fan what the fan wants, then that fan simply does not belong to your target audience.

A lot of hard core Trek fans don't belong to Star Trek's target audience.

Well told!

 

[RandyS]

If you don't give a fan what the fan wants, then that fan simply does not belong to your target audience.

A lot of hard core Trek fans don't belong to Star Trek's target audience.

I don't follow. If Star Trek isn't for us geeks, then who the hell is it for??

 

[Mudd]

If you don't give a fan what the fan wants, then that fan simply does not belong to your target audience.

A lot of hard core Trek fans don't belong to Star Trek's target audience.

I don't follow. If Star Trek isn't for us geeks, then who the hell is it for??

The millions of (mostly young) people all over the world who line up to buy tickets for the nuTrek movies - just like any other movies. Most moviegoers are not Trekkies.

 

[martok2112]

If you don't give a fan what the fan wants, then that fan simply does not belong to your target audience.

A lot of hard core Trek fans don't belong to Star Trek's target audience.

I don't follow. If Star Trek isn't for us geeks, then who the hell is it for??

In my humble opinion, Randy, I've always felt that Star Trek is for everyone who wants to partake of it. It's long been my opinion that Star Trek has something for pretty much everyone. That is why the episodes are largely different, except where story arcs show up. The movies, save for TMP and TVH have largely had an action element to them, especially the Abrams films, but even they (mostly) have a little something for everyone.


Despite my feelings about him, which I will not give further voice to because I am trying to get beyond my rather assholish tendencies, Gene Roddenberry may have had a great idea for a tv series, and a great idea for one possible future, but I don't think he intended it for geeks and nerds. He intended it to be entertainment with a hopeful message. And when one sets out to make any show or movie, one does so with the intent of reaching out to as many viewers, and hook them as possible. It's not that he intentionally reached out to nerds and geeks, but that nerds and geeks have adopted it as their own.

Again, this is only my humble opinion. I cannot speak for Gene Roddenberry.

 

[Trekkin]

You could also simply call him Adam Frankenstein, it is his name afterall.

But he's never called that in the Universal movies.

I know, but he is in the novel and the 2013 movie.

I'm interested to see what Universal's Combined Monster Universe series calls him, or who they get to play him, around 2017-18.

Heh, Van Helsing (2004) and the CMU for Universal Monsters both have drastically different reboot origins for all of them, while we're on the topic of re-imaging.

I didn't think the book actually did establish him as being named Adam, that's just how Shelley herself admitted to thinking of him. He compares himself to Adam, but makes a point that his father never named him.

Although from our POV his 'mother' did name him and...that's too meta for me to dwell on.

I wonder what Universal fans made of Penny Dreadful? Now that's a 'reimagining'. It's like some hybrid between impressive faithfulness and shout outs to the original novels, a straight-up sequel to many of them, and is also a big, long 'monster mash' movie from the 30's/40's.

 

[JWPlatt]

Wait, wait, is Frankenstein going to be in primeTrek or nuTrek?

Maybe I clicked on the wrong thread.

 

[Nebusj]

Creating a product without customer input, and maintaining a product line without customer input are two very different things.

And they do always give their target audience what it wants. They would be crazy if they didn't.

If you don't give a fan what the fan wants, then that fan simply does not belong to your target audience.

I can't help noticing a difference between ``what the audience wants'' and ``what the audience thinks it wants''.

 

[Darren Mooney]

If you don't give a fan what the fan wants, then that fan simply does not belong to your target audience.

A lot of hard core Trek fans don't belong to Star Trek's target audience.

I don't follow. If Star Trek isn't for us geeks, then who the hell is it for??

Same audience as the Avengers movies or the Nolan Batman movies. Anyone who might be interested, geek or not.

The Next Generation was a mainstream show. It got an Outstanding Drama nomination at the Emmy's. It was not a show that pandered to "us geeks."

And, again, it seems like "give a fan what a fan wants" translates as "give me what I want." Which I can understand why you'd want that, but call a spade a spade.

It seems like the self-labelled "fans" are a minority among movie-goers or cinema-fans. How would it make any sense (financially or otherwise) to cater to their needs ahead of a larger audience?

 

[CorporalCaptain]

If you don't give a fan what the fan wants, then that fan simply does not belong to your target audience.

A lot of hard core Trek fans don't belong to Star Trek's target audience.

I don't follow. If Star Trek isn't for us geeks, then who the hell is it for??

I don't understand why you would think that Star Trek films should be aimed primarily at an audience that couldn't possibly financially support the franchise. Are they supposed to be hundred-million-dollar charity cases?

 

[JarodRussell]

A lot of hard core Trek fans don't belong to Star Trek's target audience.

I don't follow. If Star Trek isn't for us geeks, then who the hell is it for??

The millions of (mostly young) people all over the world who line up to buy tickets for the nuTrek movies - just like any other movies. Most moviegoers are not Trekkies.

Until they become fans because they like what they see and want more of it. Then they automatically are removed from the target group.


The growing fanbase of Bare Chested Muscular Males and the fanbase of Females In Tight Leather Outfights gets pandered to a lot, though. They get what they want.