That's very true, but less money often does result in lesser quality.
fred freiberger : hack or hapless?
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That's very true, but less money often does result in lesser quality.
I feel the studio and the network didn't stand behind Star Trek. I don't think they ever understood the show, let alone the impact it had on so many fans. And putting it on at an hour that they KNEW would kill it off. (aside from all the budget cuts that happened each season) they put the nail in the coffin once and for all. 
Yep. I still laugh at the whole exchange about the girls working too hard:
As I recall, the Losira projection was trying to touch them, not to get them to touch her. She did butter them up a bit at first, but just to get them off guard until she could get close enough to initiate contact. There was nothing especially seductive about her approach, just friendly. All she really said to D'Amato was "Do not be afraid" and "Do not call the others." With Watkins, she expressed interest in the equipment he was using and demonstrated her understanding of the principles behind it -- anything but your stereotypical seductive-female behavior (which would've been more like "Oh, all this technical stuff is way beyond li'l ol' me, but I'm so impressed that you can do it!"). With Sulu, she explicitly said "I want to touch you," not "I want you to touch me." The only thing that could be interpreted as innuendo was her "I am for you" line, but that turned out to be a misunderstanding of its true meaning.
The contradiction was intentional. The defensive programming was part of the automatic system, so it was cold and ruthless, but the system recreated Losira's personality too well, so it manifested the remorse she would have felt. Maybe the original Losira wasn't fond of the way the defense system operated, but once the plague hit and everyone died, she had no choice but to use it.
And just as often, more money results in lesser quality, because it leads to self-indulgence and a belief that piling on spectacle will compensate for a weak story. No matter what resources you have, there are ways to use them well and ways to use them poorly.
Case in point: Syfy's 2007 Flash Gordon series. Initially, it looked very cheesy, because it was trying to be too ambitious for its budget and so its action, effects, and creature designs were weak. But later in the season, not only did they learn to spend more efficiently and get better-looking results with the budget they had, but they shifted the emphasis of the writing from action and spectacle to story and character and ideas, and it actually became a pretty intriguing show -- although, unfortunately, its early episodes had been so weak that it had lost the bulk of its audience by the time it actually got good.
I feel the studio and the network didn't stand behind Star Trek. I don't think they ever understood the show, let alone the impact it had on so many fans. And putting it on at an hour that they KNEW would kill it off. (aside from all the budget cuts that happened each season) they put the nail in the coffin once and for all.
As discussed, though, that wasn't a change they made unilaterally. NBC was willing to put the show in the premium time slot that Roddenberry wanted, but they were under pressure from Laugh-In's George Schlatter to keep his show in that slot, and they were under pressure from R. J. Reynolds to put the show on at 10 PM so they could continue advertising cigarettes on it. That's what people don't understand when they blame cancellations on executives' personal animosity toward a show. Network execs have to juggle the needs of dozens of shows and dozens of advertisers, so they have to make all sorts of compromises in putting a schedule together. So it's not that they were a bunch of jerks who hated Roddenberry or something. TV is a business, not a schoolyard. They had to balance conflicting pressures, and in this case Schlatter and Reynolds had more clout than Roddenberry.
I feel the studio and the network didn't stand behind Star Trek. I don't think they ever understood the show, let alone the impact it had on so many fans. And putting it on at an hour that they KNEW would kill it off. (aside from all the budget cuts that happened each season) they put the nail in the coffin once and for all.
Blaming the network for budget cuts is wholly unfair. NBC paid a larger license fee each season Star Trek was on the air, not a smaller one. Desilu and later Paramount were the entities that slashed the budget to cut their immediate losses, not NBC.
Blaming NBC for acting like a rational television network withthout the forsight of decades of knowledge is equally unfair. Star Trek had mediocre ratings in its first season, and these ratings only declined from there. Star Trek made less per advertisement each season, too, which further hurt the network financially.
It's easy to blame the network for putting the show in a bad time slot, too -- as long as you ignore the shows that were hits in that time slot before and after, and as long as you ignore other considerations like the network's overall schedule (Laugh-In was an enormous hit and remained so for years, Star Trek wasn't -- which would you put in the prime time slot?) and Star Trek's advertisers (RJ Reynolds couldn't sponsor the show in its proposed Monday night time slot, and Star Trek was already short of sponsors).
It's easy to cast NBC as the villain here (Gene Roddenberry did so for years afterwards on the college lecture circuit, and even turned this narrative into a promotional point for Star Trek: The Next Generation, which aired in first run syndication). It's also wrong, and Star Trek fans need to let this particular narrative go.
Right. NBC lost money on the show in every season. If they'd disliked the show, they'd have axed it after the first season, maybe even before it had a full season. (They didn't have the initial 13/back 9 pattern then, since seasons were longer, but did they have an equivalent?) They kept it despite its inadequate ratings because they liked it and wanted to give it every chance. They were also the network that brought it back in animation just four years after its live-action run ended.
At the time I think it was an accepted initial 13/follow-up 13, so contracts could be spelled out as being for a half-season. Although, and Star Trek is a prime example of this, few shows at the time had exactly 26 episodes per season. Most, like Star Trek, had more than that. Gunsmoke would routinely go over 30 (with their top count being 39). I think TNG's first season is the first time Star Trek had 26 exactly episodes in a season.
^No, TOS season 2 had 26 episodes. Season 1 had 28 (not counting pilots, and counting "The Menagerie" as one episode, since it was shot on one week's schedule under a single production number), season 2 had 26, season 3 had 24, and the full animated series was 22 (in seasons of 16 and 6). I always liked the orderly progression of that, though you do have to fudge it a bit.
The interesting thing is that the various Trek shows carried on doing 26-episode seasons well after the rest of commercial TV adopted 22 as the standard. Aside from TNG season 2, which was shortened by the strike, we didn't get another 22-episode Trek season until season 4 of ENT. (Although technically season 3 of VGR had 22 episodes in production terms, but that was in addition to 4 held back from season 2.)
The interesting thing is that the various Trek shows carried on doing 26-episode seasons well after the rest of commercial TV adopted 22 as the standard. Aside from TNG season 2, which was shortened by the strike, we didn't get another 22-episode Trek season until season 4 of ENT. (Although technically season 3 of VGR had 22 episodes in production terms, but that was in addition to 4 held back from season 2.)
I remember reading that "The 37s" was the start of an 18 episode production season. I guess that writer was mistaken.
Oh, and that 'No' I deserved. Though I think it was probably happenstance that Season 2 had 26 episodes, as much or more than they planned it that way.
Oh, and that 'No' I deserved. Though I think it was probably happenstance that Season 2 had 26 episodes, as much or more than they planned it that way.
Season three was going to be twenty six episodes as well wasn't it? Except NBC didn't order the extra two shows at the end!
JB
JB
Voyager began in midseason with a truncated 20-episode first season, just as DS9 had before it, and "The 37s" was going to be the season finale, which is why it ends with the crew getting to choose between staying on the planet and continuing the journey and picking the latter, thus reaffirming the series' premise. But UPN asked for four episodes to be held back to the start of season 2 so they could get a headstart on the premiere. So the first season ended abruptly with episode 16, "Learning Curve," and the last four episodes ("Projections," "Elogium," "Twisted," and "The 37s") were delayed to season 2, with the finale being turned into the premiere. Season 2 had 26 episodes produced, but again, the last four were held back to the next season, and this time they were actually written with that in mind, which is why they were able to do a season-bridging cliffhanger that time. But the delaying practice was ended after that, so the third production season had only 22 episodes, and after that every season had 26 (until ENT season 3 with 24 and season 4 with 22).
Ah, yes, I remember that now. UPN didn't really like Voyager that much, did they? Even though it was their breakout series that put them on the map. Of course, since they kept cancelling the following hour's shows, instead of moving them to new nights and expanding their schedule like they should have, it was their only show besides Moesha that most people remember.
I don't know, but that would have nothing to do with what I was talking about. Holding back the last four episodes for the start of the next season wasn't about punishing the show or anything -- it was about being able to start the next season earlier than would otherwise have been feasible, and thus get a bit of a jump on the other networks. Which was important for a new, small network like UPN.
Well, UPN did carry the final two seasons of Buffy, the last season of Roswell, and the first two seasons of Veronica Mars.
And every network cancels a lot of shows. It's not arbitrary; it's because their ratings aren't sufficient to offset their cost. Moving the shows wouldn't necessarily change that. They did expand their schedule, but it doesn't make much sense to try to establish a lineup on a new night by populating it with shows that have already failed in the ratings on their original night.
I willed myself through Space: 1999. The first season was actually watchable. The second was dreadful. Just horrid. I don't know if Mr. Freiberger was directly responsible or not, but one must certainly wonder about his judgement. It's as if the studio called and said, "Fred, we have another show on the ropes. Wanna finish it off for us?" To which Fed replied, "I get paid either way, right?"
Just got BBCAmerica on my Roku and they have Day of the Dove and "Hollow" on now. Both pretty credible eps, though Hollow has the Deus Ex Machina ending for McCoy's illness.
Total aside that should prob go in the "never noticed" thread, but ... when do the transporter room walls turn so purple? Is it all S3? By lighting only, or painted?
Total aside that should prob go in the "never noticed" thread, but ... when do the transporter room walls turn so purple? Is it all S3? By lighting only, or painted?
The room colors were individualized with lighting. IIRC, the show changed cinematographers in the third season, from Jerry Finnerman to Al Francis, so that could explain a difference in lighting hue/intensity.
The brief schedule is:
January 75: end of filming on season one.
August/September 75: first UK/US transmissions.
October 75: Go-ahead for season two, on condition that an American is brought in as producer.
November 75: Freiberger writes a reformatting outline.
January 76: season two starts filming.
So it's a roll-through... Season one did well enough for there to be a season two, but TPTB wanted an American-led 'improvement'. Unfortunately...
Under the pseudonym of Charles Woodgrove, FF wrote three of the worst episodes of season two. They are maybe an indication of what he was aiming for. Or maybe just an over-worked producer writing anything that would be ready to shoot next week, to balance budget over-runs elsewhere.
As happened for the first few years of Doctor Who, as serials made to end one season were held back to open the next one, allowing the BBC to pull the start date back from November to October and then September (and eventually, rather disastrously, to August, to fit round the 1968 Olympics)
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