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Star Trek: Renegades

Again, speculation. I could certainly see either of those being the case, but still speculation.

CBS has said nothing one way or the other regarding any potential TV series.
 
CBS could not possibly want the films to tank, as that would only lessen the value of the rights they possess. There is no "baggage" associated with nuTrek.
 
CBS could not possibly want the films to tank, as that would only lessen the value of the rights they possess. There is no "baggage" associated with nuTrek.

Sure they would. Whether the next film succeeds or not has little real impact on the success of Trek on the small screen, unless Star Trek Beyond were some runaway monster smash raking in nearly a billion worldwide (which it simply wont do). Even if the film nosedives that won't have any impact one whether CBS can get some 5-8 million viewers or so to watch Trek again on a weekly basis. If, as has been suggested on another thread, that there is some sort of non-competition agreement preventing CBS from producing a show, or at least creating enough legal hurdles that it's not worth their effort, then from CBS' perspective the sooner Paramount stops making films the better for them.
 
Sure they would. Whether the next film succeeds or not has little real impact on the success of Trek on the small screen, unless Star Trek Beyond were some runaway monster smash raking in nearly a billion worldwide (which it simply wont do). Even if the film nosedives that won't have any impact one whether CBS can get some 5-8 million viewers or so to watch Trek again on a weekly basis. If, as has been suggested on another thread, that there is some sort of non-competition agreement preventing CBS from producing a show, or at least creating enough legal hurdles that it's not worth their effort, then from CBS' perspective the sooner Paramount stops making films the better for them.

Wrong. A successful film franchise increases the value of what rights they possess as it keeps Trek in the forefront, increases the interest level of fans, drives media attention, etc.
If nuTrek bombs, that value will decrease due to negative media attention, the shedding of casual fans, decreased interest level in the franchise as a whole, etc.

CBS is in a perfect spot - it doesn't have to invest a penny, and yet can still make a ton of money on a valuable franchise which is regularly reinvigorated by a new film paid for by some other company.
 
Star Trek: Renegades Official said:
As promised to our backers, we engaged the top entertainment attorney in LA who has exceptional connections to CBS and Paramount.

I thought the promise was to actually present the pilot to CBS? Neither the Indiegogo Campaign nor the original Kickstarter mention engaging a "top entertainment attorney in LA." Indeed, they say they were raising funds for "a professionally produced pilot intended for presentation to CBS as a possible online series."

Now...

Star Trek: Renegades Official said:
For reasons we are not able to disclose, CBS cannot move forward with Star Trek Renegades at this time - or any Star Trek series for that matter.



But, earlier...

CBS may announce something by the 50th anniversary, or possibly a little beyond that. A decision on what the series will ultimately be is not set yet, but there will be a series.

Sadly, I can't talk about it. So that said, you don't have to believe me since I can't provide the source at this time. You will simply have to wait till next year (possibly sooner) to see if I'm correct. A series will happen in 2017.

Well, which is it?

'Near future' meaning 2015 and 2016. I still believe a new series will happen by 2017, but of course that is ultimately up to CBS

As for the entertainment lawyer, when studios and producers pitch pilots and ideas to networks, they almost always have to have a lawyer help represent them. That is standard practice in the industry. The better the lawyer the more doors you can get into.

@Bill, We only found out about this fairly recently, If we knew this when we started we would not have tried (obviously) to present this to CBS as a pilot. We did not tell out backers STR was going to definitely be a new series or intentionally get peoples hopes up, we said we would try to pitch it to CBS as a new series and we did just that. If you go back in this thread you will see that I ALWAYS said there is no guarantee that CBS would pick it up but we were going to try.
 
I would tend to agree with Jedi Master. If Marvel is any indication of the value system at play, their TV series basically function as advertisements for the films. It's very likely possible that Paramount/CBS view the tiering system the same way when it comes to Star Trek.

The other thing to consider -- the Abrams/nuTrek films have been quite successful for Paramount.

For all the ballyhooing of fans, neither Star Trek or Star Trek Into Darkness were the financial or critical duds that Star Trek V or Star Trek Nemesis were.

The films were also much better received (financially and critically) than the majority of Star Trek: Voyager and Star Trek: Enterprise.

No matter how much the Warped9s of fandom may wail and kick and scream about the inherent quality of the films, they are but a small, vocal contingent of the fandom and not at all representative of the majority mainstream viewing public. You know, the actual audience Paramount and CBS are after.

I see no (business) reason why CBS would want to distance itself from the features apart, unless CBS itself wants to launch a series free (creatively) of any connection to it.
 
So going forward - no solicitation will be made for funds based upon the premise this is a pilot for presentation to CBS?
 
Star Trek: Renegades Official said:
As promised to our backers, we engaged the top entertainment attorney in LA who has exceptional connections to CBS and Paramount.

I thought the promise was to actually present the pilot to CBS? Neither the Indiegogo Campaign nor the original Kickstarter mention engaging a "top entertainment attorney in LA." Indeed, they say they were raising funds for "a professionally produced pilot intended for presentation to CBS as a possible online series."

Now...





But, earlier...



Sadly, I can't talk about it. So that said, you don't have to believe me since I can't provide the source at this time. You will simply have to wait till next year (possibly sooner) to see if I'm correct. A series will happen in 2017.

Well, which is it?

'Near future' meaning 2015 and 2016. I still believe a new series will happen by 2017,but of course that is ultimately up to CBS

That's not what you said last month. A month ago you made it sound as if this was official information you somehow had access to, and tried to pass it off as such. Whether it was clumsy wording on your part or not, that's how it came across to a lot of us here.

As for the entertainment lawyer, when studios and producers pitch pilots and idea for networks they almost always have to have a lawyer help represent them. That is standard practice in the industry. The better the lawyer the more doors you can get into.

Yes, but from the sound of it, you guys didn't even get in the door to do the pitch. By your description then, it sounds like the lawyer you guys got wasn't all that great. Also: who paid his retainer? The Kickstarter funds?

@Bill We only found out about this fairly recently, If we knew this when we started we would not have tried (obviously) to present this to CBS as a pilot.

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As others have noted, CBS has remained silent, Renegades has indicated that CBS is currently unable to produce a Trek TV series. Renegades is therefore intending to produce an ongoing fan series of their own.

Normally, I'd be somewhat skeptical of fan films making statements of what CBS can and cannot do, but this is one of the cases where I'm giving it some credence, mainly because of CBS' own actions. As of right now, CBS has allowed various fan film groups to raise something on the order of two million dollars overall specifically to produce Star Trek fan films, many of which have received a fair amount of media attention. That's unusual to say the least; I can't think of another rights owner that's been as accepting of fan film fundraising.

So for the moment, I'm going to have to say that there might be something to it, especially since the split between CBS and Paramount was obviously neither clear nor simple.

All of which is largely circumstantial evidence.

This is a cash grab, pure and simple.

Renegades raised a shitload of money on the promise that they were pitching their film to CBS as a pilot. For whatever reasons (as most of us suspected anyway) this did not end up happening.

Now with a little side-eye clever-speak, and with no response from CBS one way or the other, Renegades is saying that even though they won't get to be the new series, CBS is still not going to make a new series anytime soon (also contradicting statements made by Tom the last few months about a new series coming by 2017 (even though he "couldn't" elaborate on it, why or how he knows, and what it would be).

Finally, now here we are -- no new series, but Renegades has put forth an ambitious schedule (even by actual, professional television production standards) for a new "season" of fan films to be crowdfunded by the fans.

I mean, how gullible do they think fandom is? This is clearly their way of coming back to fans with their hat in their hand, asking for more money but doing as much as they can to shield themselves from the eventual (and rightful) queries about what happened with their very vocalized and public attempt to pitch to CBS.
 
Are you forgetting the obvious? we put out a film, and we did it for under 400k. We did pitch it to CBS as promised, that's the bottom line.

Again as for 2017, that's when they can make a series, I believe they will. But 2017, is not now.

Also, cash grab? Are you joking me. If you think you can make a better film Karzak than feel to, heck I will even donate to your film to help you out.
 
Are you forgetting the obvious? we put out a film, and we did it for under 400k. We did pitch it to CBS as promised, that's the bottom line.

Again as for 2017, that's when they can make a series, I believe they will. But 2017, is not now.

So going forward - no solicitation will be made for funds based upon the premise this is a pilot for presentation to CBS?
 
I guess my question is: Did Tim Russ and Sky Conway actually sit down with the people at CBS who had the authority to make this decision?
 
So going forward - no solicitation will be made for funds based upon the premise this is a pilot for presentation to CBS?

No, since we mentioned CBS is not wanting to do a series 'at this time'. If we are still making Renegades by the time CBS is ready, they already know about us. It there decision what they want to do.
 
Sure they would. Whether the next film succeeds or not has little real impact on the success of Trek on the small screen, unless Star Trek Beyond were some runaway monster smash raking in nearly a billion worldwide (which it simply wont do). Even if the film nosedives that won't have any impact one whether CBS can get some 5-8 million viewers or so to watch Trek again on a weekly basis. If, as has been suggested on another thread, that there is some sort of non-competition agreement preventing CBS from producing a show, or at least creating enough legal hurdles that it's not worth their effort, then from CBS' perspective the sooner Paramount stops making films the better for them.

Wrong. A successful film franchise increases the value of what rights they possess as it keeps Trek in the forefront, increases the interest level of fans, drives media attention, etc.
If nuTrek bombs, that value will decrease due to negative media attention, the shedding of casual fans, decreased interest level in the franchise as a whole, etc.

CBS is in a perfect spot - it doesn't have to invest a penny, and yet can still make a ton of money on a valuable franchise which is regularly reinvigorated by a new film paid for by some other company.

Sorry, but we are not talking about a tentpole franchise here. In spite of Paramount's fervent wishes, the Star Trek film series is just not that important to your avaerage film viewer. Star Trek's failure or success at the boxoffice will ultimately have little impact on how it performs for CBS... this isn't a franchise on the level of Marvel or Transformers (just in terms of dollars).

So let's take Into Darkness. Domestically the film grossed $228 million (actually it revises down to $221 million for inflation). With an average ticket price of $8.12 that mean roughly 29 million tickets were sold at the boxoffice (Age of Ultron doubles that number).

CBS knows they have a built in install base of around 2 million viewers who would eagerly watch a new series. They really only need to convince around 3 million more people to watch a show to justify their investment.

But I will agree with you on one point... CBS really is in no hurry at this point as they make money doing nothing. But ultimately the film franchise will have little impact on CBS' final decision.
 
BTW, we are taking feedback on things you did not like about the pilot, like the Starfleet uniforms for instance. We want to improve upon any mistakes made in the pilot.
 
But I will agree with you on one point... CBS really is in no hurry at this point as they make money doing nothing. But ultimately the film franchise will have little impact on CBS' final decision.

But earlier you said....

CBS is simply holding out until the film series ends, and I highly suspect they are banking on the next film not doing so well. Once Paramount bows out of future Trek films (for the time being), CBS can make their move and revisit Trek without the perceived "baggage" of the NuTrek films.

So which is it?
 
BTW, we are taking feedback on things you did not like about the pilot, like the Starfleet uniforms for instance. We want to improve upon any mistakes made in the pilot.

The first place you need to start then is your scripts. If the next episodes are anything like the first, a good script editor is something you guys are in dire need of.
 
BTW, we are taking feedback on things you did not like about the pilot, like the Starfleet uniforms for instance. We want to improve upon any mistakes made in the pilot.

The first place you need to start then is your scripts. If the next episodes are anything like the first, a good script editor is something you guys are in dire need of.

I suggested a script editor upthread, funnily enough. And suggested changing the Starfleet costumes. :)
 
Why would CBS tell some rinky-dink fan production house what their larger plans (or lack of them) were at all, other than to say "thanks, but no thanks" to their "pilot"?
 
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