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Discovery Showrunners fired; Kurtzman takes over

I'm a Berman fan, or fan of the Berman era of Trek (TNG-ENT). I never got the criticism against him either. He was a lot more faithful to Roddenberry's vision than either Abrams, or CBS. Sometimes I think the Star Trek fan base is just as toxic as the Star Wars fan base.

There were some rabid crazies who were calling Rick Berman the Anti-Christ and I won't defend that... but thinking it was time for him to move on in 2001 is toxic?
 
Personally I just didn't want a post-VGR series because the novels got that covered and such a series would most likely contradict them in some way.

They should go 100 years in the future, same as TNG, and roughly the same thing Doctor Who did in 2003. It's far enough to give you essentially complete freedom without erasing anything that came before. That's how you reboot Star Trek. (And, really, before Ronald D. Moore and a couple other old-time fans came on and started making more intricate ties to TOS, TNG really was, functionally, a reboot. Almost as divisive, too! But better off for its more cautious approach.)

And you can still have Admiral McCoy (or, in this case, maybe Admiral Picard or The Immortal Doctor Phlox) show up once for fan service.

Or just stop the endless navel-gazing. Tell some stories that aren't about Klingon in-fighting or the Mirror Universe or Sarek or Section 31 or Khan's blood or secret chapters of Federation history. Think less "Star Trek" and more "Wagon Train to the stars."

I used to always say that, if I ran Star Trek, I'd make new writers watch some good episodes of Star Trek. I still might do that. But, at this point, Star Trek has turned so inward on itself, like a decadent academic discipline, that I would actually require new writers to watch some good episodes of Wagon Train, Master and Commander, and read some Hornblower. And then maybe a few good Trek episodes tacked on at the end of that.

Also, I would ban the writer's room from accessing Memory Alpha for the entire first season. Continuity can be a powerful tool for worldbuilding, but it can become a crutch to avoid worldbuilding, and -- as my current signature indicates -- I think it's 1000% the latter right now. (True in almost every franchise at the moment, not just Star Trek.)
 
hopefully this show will now be more family friendly...vs.. this rated R./mature level show :( that seems to push a clear left/political agenda

Star Trek has always had left/political perspective except with some very prudish conservative values when it comes to sex or anything considered sexual which back then would be gay people and any kind of romance that wasn't rooted in a very old school nuclear family type of thinking. Which was a kind of weird way to go when your also doing things like catsuits and pushup brawls.
Only difference is that some of the language use to talk about social issues on this show uses more modern phrasing. Things like "Make the Empire great again" and putting more emphaiss on the racism in the empire instead of just treating them as asshole pirates and stuff of that nature. Plus while the diversity of the main cast is very over-hyped and undeserved compared to what you see on other tv shows now but even when it comes to past Trek's one big difference is the diversity when comes to extra's and day players and characters of that nature. In past on "TNG" for example if you had to extra's serving as security officers walking behind Worf they were most likely to just be two white dudes. Now the extra's could be a black male and female asian or any number of possible types of people of different backgrounds.

Jason
 
I used to always say that, if I ran Star Trek, I'd make new writers watch some good episodes of Star Trek. I still might do that. But, at this point, Star Trek has turned so inward on itself, like a decadent academic discipline, that I would actually require new writers to watch some good episodes of Wagon Train, Master and Commander, and read some Hornblower. And then maybe a few good Trek episodes tacked on at the end of that.

Would love for them to solicit scripts from some good writers for a new, unnamed spaceship-based show set in the future that explores the human condition through metaphor and allegory. Provide a brief rundown of the characters' roles and personalities and then let the writers have at it.

What they did with TOS, basically.
 
The only thing Star Trek needs to be is accessible, and I don't mean in "It's stupid to have it on streaming network only!" sort of way

And demanding strict adherence to timelines and continuity and canon and all that is not accessible. But if writers want to scour Memory Alpha for ideas or inspiration or to help build their backstory that's perfectly fine. Preferable even.

One thing I've noticed is when a lot of fans talk about "continuity" what they really mean is consistency. Those two things are not the same.

For example, in the lead-up to Beyond when the picture of Sulu's daughter first showed up, there was some discussion on what her name was going to be. Pegg/Jung could have used any name they wanted to but decided to keep Demora. That's consistency; not continuity.

And for a long time, the only thing Star Trek has ever tried to be is consistent. "Canon" was always an enterprise of the fandom. And didn't become an official construct until fairly recently. This is why, for all practical intents and purposes, every iteration has been its own "reboot." Each showrunner or filmmaker has done his best to keep things consistent but has never tried to pigeonhole his story into some grand canon puzzle.

And then the Disco people came along and made this big declaration that was exactly what they were going to do. At best it was PR gaffe. At worst it was stupid, short-sighted, and even a bit unprofessional. And if the show continues to struggle, will most certainly be seen as the epicenter of the discord in the future.
 
If it doesn't pick up by Season 3 I'd be happy to see it end and start over with something closer to what Star Trek is. Discovery deserves a chance to prove itself but if it doesn't there's no point flogging a dead carcass.

I have to say I enjoyed the formula of the Original Series and the Berman spin offs and would've been happy to have it back. Law And Order has been doing the same thing for decades and people are still eating it up.

Star Trek should be Star Trek and not some pretentious soap opera. Just give me good sci-fi, thoughtful stories, cool aliens and engaging characters. I couldn't care less about it being edgy and woke.
 
Are Rod and Meyer gone too? If Kurtzman kept them on, maybe there's hope.

EDIT: "Sources say the budget for the season two premiere ballooned, with the overages expected to come out of subsequent episodes from Discovery's sophomore run." They had to build sets/uniforms for the Discoprise, and not out of recycled Shenhzou either - what the hell did the studio expect??
Um. They expect professionals who know how to plan/budget within the limits set by the studio.
 
I dunno, Gene built quite a career seeking out back pats. It was pretty much his job for a while. ;)

"Yes, it's true. I wasn't just merely creating a television show, that the evil execs at NBC fought tooth and nail because they didn't want to lose Dixie, I was also creating a blueprint for The Future. This, the perfectibility of Man. We're evolving and the only direction we can evolve in is toward Perfection. No conflict, no corruption, no Watergate. The future is a Paradise. And, one day, we will bring that vision back to television. Star Trek will rise again from the ashes!

How much am I getting paid for this speech again? Uh-huh. Uh-huh. Oh.... Okay.


Yes, Star Trek shall rise again and, in the future, we won't need money. We won't have bills to pay because money won't matter in the future. Thank you all, and don't forget to see the movie when it comes out. Multiple times if you have to. We all have to eat... and that's why we'll have food replicators in The Future. Yes. Thank you all, live long and prosper, and good night!"
 
But you could have told different sorts of stories within the Trek format and had it still interesting. What about an entire series following Starfleet Intelligence agents working against the Orion Syndicate? Or a Federation science ship which basically focuses on xenoarcheology, looking for the great relics of advanced races millions of years old?


What about no?

That kind of thing appeals to a tiny number of people who really are deeply invested in Star Trek. "Starfleet" is a word that trekkies are invested in, and words like "Orion Syndicate" give them goosebumps.

Trek was created and succeeded as a very broad kind of action/dramatic show, a pretty smart show that eventually developed into a sort of workplace drama with Spandex wardrobe and the occasional ray-gun blast - and in the process reached an evolutionary cul-de-sac that saw its audience wither away and drift to other entertainments that offered more novelty and more depth.

Fans hate it, but Abrams was right, as MacFarlane is right: if Trek doesn't go big again it will just go away.

I would actually require new writers to watch some good episodes of Wagon Train, Master and Commander, and read some Hornblower. And then maybe a few good Trek episodes tacked on at the end of that.

I'd require them to watch good TV and movies made in the last ten years.
 
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