Why is Star Trek not that popular in younger people?

[Mudd]

...The result is a property that's fallen completely out of touch with the tastes and expectations of the modern audience.

I question whether anyone really has a finger on "the tastes and expectations of the modern audience."

No one has suggested that "anyone" does - but the folks who finance and create mass entertainment right now successfully produce thousands of hours of movies and television every year that to varying degrees accord with what people, especially the so-desirable youth demographic, want to see. In the broadest sense they do know what they're doing, and oldTrek is not what they're doing because it's not what people want to see. Tastes have moved on.

oldTrek is not much like modern entertainment. It is very much like the shows I watched when I was fifteen years old; one of them was the original Star Trek. There's no reason to believe that Star Trek can be the sole exception that thrives by fossilization rather than innovation after five decades.

 

[FormerLurker]

I keep seeing posts in this thread from young people saying "I'm the only one in my school that likes Trek". The fact is, many of your fellow students like it, they just find it difficult, for a wide variety of reasons, to admit it. I went to school throughout the '70s and early '80s, and often thought I was the only fan of Star Trek, especially when the bullies in my school targeted me for it. Many years later, I've learned that many, to most of my fellow students growing up at least liked Star Trek, if not actually 'fans' of it.

They may not have quite the same opinion about Star Trek, its quality, or its timelessness, but a larger percentage of your schoolmates like it, watch it,and enjoy doing so than you might think.

 

[Mudd]

Marina Sirtis once said that on TNG the characters didn't converse - "we hit our marks and declaim." Quite so.

Trek fans want Star Trek to be taken seriously as "adult" while never veering outside the safety of being a "family show."

 

[Phantom]

oldTrek is not much like modern entertainment. It is very much like the shows I watched when I was fifteen years old; one of them was the original Star Trek. There's no reason to believe that Star Trek can be the sole exception that thrives by fossilization rather than innovation after five decades.

I don't call dumbing-down and sexing-up "innovative". I call it "cynica"l. I call it "pandering to the lowest common denominator". Because it is both. Trek should have more substance than the average Tom Cruise movie.

Yes, the current cultural winds are against Trek. But winds change. Sooner or later, a more positive, optimistic outlook will return. Trek needs to be ready for when it does.

 

[C.E. Evans]

I think in general Trek just skews towards an older crowd. Sure, there are aspects of Trek that can appeal even to kids--it worked for me when I was a kid--but Trek really doesn't do much to purposely reel in a younger crowd, IMO (one could argue though, that young characters like Wesley Crusher and Jake Sisko were attempts to do that).

 

[JWPlatt]

...Yet the show was so successful that it became the template for three further series, none of which updated the style and pace nearly enough to keep up with other contemporary popular entertainment.

The result is a property that's fallen completely out of touch with the tastes and expectations of the modern audience.

...to varying degrees accord with what people... want to see. ...oldTrek is not... what people want to see. Tastes have moved on.

So what is the updated, contemporary style that people want? Knowing the contrast, and that there is one, might better inform the discussion and whether it is reasonable. For example, Phantom's simplistic hyperbole says you mean "dumbing-down and sexing-up." I doubt that's the case, but we don't know unless you spell it out for us from your POV.

 

[Mudd]

oldTrek is not much like modern entertainment. It is very much like the shows I watched when I was fifteen years old; one of them was the original Star Trek. There's no reason to believe that Star Trek can be the sole exception that thrives by fossilization rather than innovation after five decades.

I don't call dumbing-down and sexing-up "innovative". I call it "cynica"l. I call it "pandering to the lowest common denominator". Because it is both. Trek should have more substance than the average Tom Cruise movie.

Yes, the current cultural winds are against Trek. But winds change. Sooner or later, a more positive, optimistic outlook will return. Trek needs to be ready for when it does.

Yeah, which is why movies are written and performed the way they were in the 1930s - because this stuff actually goes in cycles.

You can hold your breath waiting for the return of that "good ol' time entertainment" if you like. Fact is that the audience and styles have moved on and oldTrek is never coming back in the form you like to imagine. It's dead.

 

[Mudd]

Basically, while no one might have predicted that Got would be a big hit, the creators approached it as did the folks behind "Mad Men," "Breaking Bad" and so on. That begins with portrayals of human emotions, motives and behavior that are far more observant and nuanced than fits into the oldTrek format. Human beings in adult drama may be complex but they're motivated by a few simple things, none of which are really acknowledged in Star Trek. Characters who hold themselves to standards, follow ideals and act heroically are still motivated by the same kinds of things, and that's a good part of their struggles and conflicts both with themselves and others.

If you want to cling to the simplistic, supposedly Utopian characterizations of oldTrek you're not creating something that will hold the attention of a lot of intelligent adults for very long. You're doing "family" or kid's stories.

If you can't let go of those simplistic Trek characters, well then you can always feature them in stories which bring a little faux "darkness" into the mix by addressing controversy in ways that will leave the kids behind while not challenging the audience at all and call that adult - but then you're just producing yet another CSI or NCIS or Blue Bloods or one of dozens of other procedurals that the networks crap out to distract a somewhat older and undemanding audience. If that's what you want, have a great time.

 

[BillJ]

Trek should have more substance than the average Tom Cruise movie.

Why? It hasn't before. I've been watching Star Trek since 1975 and am still waiting for this deep, progressive franchise everyone keeps talking about.

 

[The Wormhole]

The answer is simply three words:

Insufficient attention span.

GOT has much more complexity and is quite popular.

GOT is popular because it has boobs.

 

[fireproof78]

The answer is simply three words:

Insufficient attention span.

GOT has much more complexity and is quite popular.

GOT is popular because it has boobs.

Ugh, so tired of GOT.

Though, in an interesting bit of comparison, I have not gotten in to GOT because I few it as a complex world and there is too much for me to catch up on for me to enjoy it.

I've seen Star Trek be described as too complicated or inaccesible due to all the material that is out there. I think that Star Trek is accessible due to growing up with it, but if I had not done so, then I might not react the same way.

 

[Mudd]

The answer is simply three words:

Insufficient attention span.

GOT has much more complexity and is quite popular.

GOT is popular because it has boobs.

Probably not so much.

I like boobs. A lot.

There is no shortage of boobage anywhere on this end of the media planet, ever. If boobage is what I seek - okay, when I seek it - why in hell would I ever pay for a premium cable channel and turn away from surfing the net long enough to watch an hour of any TV drama?

We laugh when the tits and ass show up on GoT - "okay, how many minutes in this time? Okay, that's the weekly quotient, they can move on."

"People watch it for the tits" is a punchline that would been plausible fifteen years ago. Not today.

 

[The Wormhole]

GOT has much more complexity and is quite popular.

GOT is popular because it has boobs.

Probably not so much.

I like boobs. A lot.

There is no shortage of boobage anywhere on this end of the media planet, ever. If boobage is what I seek - okay, when I seek it - why in hell would I ever pay for a premium cable channel and turn away from surfing the net long enough to watch an hour of any TV drama?

We laugh when the tits and ass show up on GoT - "okay, how many minutes in this time? Okay, that's the weekly quotient, they can move on."

"People watch it for the tits" is a punchline that would been plausible fifteen years ago. Not today.

All I know is whenever anyone tries to sell me on GOT "it has boobs" is all they say. Hell, just three weeks ago my boss ranted on for five minutes about how great GOT is because of the boobs. Even women I know go on about the boobs in GOT.

 

[plynch]

Trek is out there, in the public consciousness. Moreso The Original Series and reboot movies than the 90's spin-offs, though. Everyone knows who Kirk and Spock are, far less know about Janeway or Sisko.

I'm only at the start of this thread, but I'll jump in. A great many of my midwestern high school students have NO idea who Kirk and Spock are. Not even from the recent movies.

In the 1980s did the general kid know movie characters from 50! years prior? I saw posters of WC Fields and Laurel and Hardy -- had NO idea. Or main characters from the golden age of radio?

UPDATE: (I read more of the thread. . .)
I was the high school chess club advisor and have been quiz bowl coach for 10 years put together. I have my pulse on the nerd community, my peeps. Even THEY aren't into Trek.

DOCTOR WHO, baby!! Tardis everything, sonic screwdrivers, lunchboxes, etc. (It's well done in its way, and is on EVERY week. They dig Marvel movies too. They'll do SW as soon as ep7 debuts, I bet.

I listen to my daughter (who's on this board somewhere btw) trying to explain Trek to others in her tribe. She JUST got a big Trek illustrated dictionary (from my wife and I of course) for her birthday and was walking her friends through it.

If ANYone woulda been already into Trek, it woulda been her friends. "Wow. sounds interesting," one said after hearing about Jem Hadar and DS9." Never had heard of 'em ever before.

I find myself agreeing with Dennis. Tastes change. It's ok. Move on.

 

[Autistoid]

GOT has much more complexity and is quite popular.

GOT is popular because it has boobs.

Probably not so much.

I like boobs. A lot.

There is no shortage of boobage anywhere on this end of the media planet, ever. If boobage is what I seek - okay, when I seek it - why in hell would I ever pay for a premium cable channel and turn away from surfing the net long enough to watch an hour of any TV drama?

We laugh when the tits and ass show up on GoT - "okay, how many minutes in this time? Okay, that's the weekly quotient, they can move on."

"People watch it for the tits" is a punchline that would been plausible fifteen years ago. Not today.

Agreed this is my biggest complaint with enterprise, the idea that 14 year old boys were drooling over a half naked tpol.

It was absolute nonsense, even back in 2001 i thought that crap was tacky and at best for someone like my dad.

I grew up with internet porn.

Granted it's appreciated in some form as a way of illustrating the real life of someone.

Nudity to me isn't really a big deal, however it does show a lot of the humanness of a character.

My pet peeve is when you never see a character out of their uniform, or eating, or other basic parts of life.

 

[Nerys Myk]

When I was in Jr. High School in the early 1970s, there was only one other Star Trek fan at my school. When he moved, I was the only one. It remained that way through High School. In College, it was me and that same guy. ( He moved back to my area for College). Then the Trek movies began. So it seemed like there were more fans or at least people interest going to Trek movies. Plus I began hanging out with other fans. Fans I met through my job at a bookstore. Which seemed to be a mecca for genre fans. Still not an overwhelming "majority"

So I guess I'm wondering if we see Trek's past "popularity" through rose colored glasses? People saw the movies and watched TNG but did all of those people become hardcore fans? Or did they, like with many other entertainments watch, enjoy and move on?

 

[Starbreaker]

Star Trek has been off the air for a decade. The two movies were decently popular, but they're so radically different from the TV shows that they're not going to start any kind of phenomenon. Science fiction just isn't popular overall. Superheroes and paranormal fantasy have been the norm for the past decade.

 

[Nerys Myk]

Science Fiction isn't popular?

All-Time Box Office: USA

1. Avatar (2009) $760,505,847
2. Titanic (1997) $658,672,302
3. The Avengers (2012) $623,279,547
4. Jurassic World (2015) $569,287,130
5. The Dark Knight (2008) $533,316,061
6. Star Wars: Episode I - The Phantom Menace (1999) $474,544,677
7. Star Wars (1977) $460,935,665
8. Avengers: Age of Ultron (2015) $454,199,000
9. The Dark Knight Rises (2012) $448,130,642
10. Shrek 2 (2004) $436,471,036
11. E.T. the Extra-Terrestrial (1982) $434,949,459
12. The Hunger Games: Catching Fire (2013) $424,645,577
13. Pirates of the Caribbean: Dead Man's Chest (2006) $423,032,628
14. The Lion King (1994) $422,783,777
15. Toy Story 3 (2010) $414,984,497
16. Iron Man 3 (2013) $408,992,272
17. The Hunger Games (2012) $407,999,255
18. Spider-Man (2002) $403,706,375
19. Jurassic Park (1993) $402,348,347
20. Transformers: Revenge of the Fallen (2009) $402,076,689

2014 Box Office: USA

1.Guardians of the Galaxy (2014) $333.1 million
2.The Hunger Games: Mockingjay - Part 1 (2014) $323.7 million*
3.Captain America: The Winter Soldier (2014) $259.8 million
4.The Lego Movie (2014) $257.8 million
5.Transformers: Age of Extinction (2014) $245.4 million
6. Maleficent (2014) $241.4 million
7. X-Men: Days of Future Past (2014)$233.9 million
8. The Hobbit: The Battle of the Five Armies (2014) $220.6 million*
9.Big Hero 6 (2014) $211.2 million*
10. Dawn of the Planet of the Apes (2014) $208.5 million
11. The Amazing Spider-Man 2 (2014) $202.9 million ” - IMDb-Editors
12. Godzilla (2014) $200.7 million
13. 22 Jump Street (2014) $191.7 million
14. Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles (2014) $191.2 million ” - IMDb-Editors
15. Interstellar (2014) $182.8 million
16. How to Train Your Dragon 2 (2014) $177 million
17. Gone Girl (2014) $166.7 million
18. Divergent (2014) $150.9 million
19. Neighbors (2014) $150.2 million
20. Ride Along (2014) $134.9 million

And yes Superhero movies often fall under the SF heading. Not sure what "paranormal fantasy" is.

 

[CorporalCaptain]

^ The Dark Knight needs boldfacing, making SF 4/5 of the all-time top five. Gotta wonder about Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, too, in 2014.

 

[Nerys Myk]

^ The Dark Knight needs boldfacing, making SF 4/5 of the all-time top five. Gotta wonder about Teenage Mutant Ninja Turtles, too, in 2014.

Thanks. I wasn't sure about TMNT. I suppose if mutated turtles don't count then neither do giant lizards with atomic breath.