Poll Should the fans be running the show?

[HotRod]

PICARD season 3 actually felt like Star Trek again.

Spoiler

By doing exactly what other seasons of NuTrek have done.

Professional characters

Spoiler

They disobeyed orders and essentially hijacked a ship to rescue an old girlfriend. Very professional

dialog that doesn't sound like some CW show

Spoiler

You had the seemingly main villian practically twirling a mustache throughout half the season while Riker and Worf make yuk yuk jokes.

several new ideas

Spoiler

If by new ideas, you mean ripping off scenes from other Trek products while bringing back the same tired old villian we've already seen too many times?

Plus it managed to work with the baggage of season 1.

Spoiler

by eliminating most of the cast of the previous seasons

 

[Greg Cox]

Batman didn't really go 'dark' as we understand it these days until 1985, after Crisis when Miller took over.

The 1939 stuff is quite silly. Comics were silly back then. Though Batman was certainly less silly than some.

To be fair, Denny O'Neill and Neal Adams brought Batman back to his darker roots, after all the Silver Age silliness, before Frank Miller did.

There's a tendency to simplify the narrative by asserting that Miller single-handedly rescued Batman from Adam West campiness with The Dark Knight Returns, whereas that process had already begun in the 1970s, under O'Neill's watch. Turning the Joker back into a homicidal maniac, etc.

(It's perhaps more accurate to assert that Miller changed the general public's perception of Batman rather than the actual content of the comics. Batman hadn't been "Zap! Bam! Pow!" for some time at that point, but it took The Dark Knight Returns to get mainstream media to notice that.)

 

[DarrenTR1970]

To be fair, Denny O'Neill and Neal Adams brought Batman back to his darker roots, after all the Silver Age silliness, before Frank Miller did.

There's a tendency to simplify the narrative by asserting that Miller single-handedly rescued Batman from Adam West campiness with The Dark Knight Returns, whereas that process had already begun in the 1970s, under O'Neill's watch. Turning the Joker back into a homicidal maniac, etc.

(It's perhaps more accurate to assert that Miller changed the general public's perception of Batman rather than the actual content. Batman hadn't been "Zap! Bam! Pow!" for some time at that point, but it took The Dark Knight Returns to get mainstream media to notice that.)

Comic Book Resources recently did an article on it being 50 years ago this month (July) that saw the return of the 'Clown Prince of Crime' to the Batman comic and that he was no longer the character as portrayed in the TV show but a homicidal killer.

 

[The Wormhole]

This poll should probably have the caveat that professional fans with proven track records who don't want to make Star Trek "their own" should be running the show. Reference the great turnarounds under Manny Coto (gone too soon) and yes, "Lord" Terry Matalas.

I'll give Manny Coto some points, since, blatant fanwank aside, Enterprise S4 was a well-structured season, with the season being comprised of multiple mini-arcs with the odd standalone tossed in. It was a fresh format for a season to be done in which allowed storylines to breathe without stretching them out to the point of feeling like it's padded. I wouldn't mind another season done in a similar format, just without the in your face fanwank.

Matalas on the other hand, basically filmed his TNG fanfic and called it Season 3. And the pacing was horrible, just look at how long the mystery box was stretched to and milked out before finally revealing what it was. Maybe Matalas himself has some talent, though flawed I will admit that season 2 of Picard had some merit, but while watching season 3 there are times I find it hard to believe a professional TV producer was involved with that season rather than a rabid fan wanting to outdo his own excessive fannish desires at every turn.

 

[fireproof78]

I mean, any producer is going to run the show based upon their own indulgences is going to create division. Matalas just happened to indulge in a way that felt familiar to some fans.

The difficulty with fans in general is there is a huge reluctance to "kill your darlings" in the service to the greater story. Fans become attached to certain characters for a lot of reasons, so if the story involves putting them in any sort of harm's way then the character must survive.

All of these stack up in a way to curtail good storytelling. Again, look at how the response was towards Meyer and Bennett for killing off Spock. Yet the story works incredibly well, but fans would never write it.

 

[1001001]

Matalas on the other hand, basically filmed his TNG fanfic and called it Season 3. And the pacing was horrible, just look at how long the mystery box was stretched to and milked out before finally revealing what it was. Maybe Matalas himself has some talent, though flawed I will admit that season 2 of Picard had some merit, but while watching season 3 there are times I find it hard to believe a professional TV producer was involved with that season rather than a rabid fan wanting to outdo his own excessive fannish desires at every turn.

Season 3 started off really well, only to shit the bed with the Big Reveal. Seasons 1 and 2 are about the worst seasons in all of Trek.

 

[Sci]

Season 3 started off really well, only to shit the bed with the Big Reveal. Seasons 1 and 2 are about the worst seasons in all of Trek.

Nope. That honor goes to VOY Seasons Six and Seven and ENT Seasons One and Two, with an honorable mention to TNG Season One.

PIC Season One was one of the greatest seasons of Star Trek ever produced. PIC Season Two was more troubled, but at least it had both character depth and a point, which is more than late VOY and early ENT can say for themselves.

 

[Tim Walker]

Professionals, who casually watched the shows. Knowing the background, while being somewhat detached.

 

[JonnyQuest037]

Professionals, who've made a total of 6 1/2 professional sales, who casually watched TOS-VOY while playing with their dogs for the first 15 minutes and taking a phone call during the last 10. Knowing the correct pronunciation of every character's name on ENT, while also being hazy when it comes to the exact plot details of the 15th episode of each season. Having watched the first 3/4ths of each season of PIC until their Paramount+ subscription lapsed, and then suffered a massive head wound that made them forget half of what they saw.

Only pros with this exact resume have the correct combination of talents to take Star Trek back to its former heights.

 

[Nyotarules]

Well, it might surprise you that most singers, unless they are a singer-songwriter, don't compose their own music anyway. Most of it is bought or sold-to, or written specifically for them by other musicians.

Not a surprise but the singer/musician is not relying on the fans for their material.

 

[Owain Taggart]

Not a surprise but the singer/musician is not relying on the fans for their material.

That too. I forgot that part.

 

[Nyotarules]

This isn't meant as a gotcha moment but more a really painful observation that what feels like Trek is hard to nail down.

Trek isn't a feeling, it is more important than that....

And then you are making a TV show by committee. Who's version of Star Trek is more important?

Mine of course!
If any fan wants to run a Trek show, then get seriously, stinking rich then you can produce whatever you want once you buy the rights. However, you might be the only person watching

 

[Richard S. Ta]

To be fair, Denny O'Neill and Neal Adams brought Batman back to his darker roots, after all the Silver Age silliness, before Frank Miller did.

There's a tendency to simplify the narrative by asserting that Miller single-handedly rescued Batman from Adam West campiness with The Dark Knight Returns, whereas that process had already begun in the 1970s, under O'Neill's watch. Turning the Joker back into a homicidal maniac, etc.

(It's perhaps more accurate to assert that Miller changed the general public's perception of Batman rather than the actual content of the comics. Batman hadn't been "Zap! Bam! Pow!" for some time at that point, but it took The Dark Knight Returns to get mainstream media to notice that.)

I can’t disagree with any of that.

I always enjoy your posts, Greg.

 

[TREK_GOD_1]

There's a tendency to simplify the narrative by asserting that Miller single-handedly rescued Batman from Adam West campiness with The Dark Knight Returns, whereas that process had already begun in the 1970s, under O'Neill's watch.

Robbins and Novick led that charge pre-O'Neil/Adams, and the readers sending in letters at the time were certainly appreciative of the creative team returning the dark Batman to the comics.

 

[fireproof78]

Trek isn't a feeling, it is more important than that....

It's... "more than a feeling" *starts singing.*

Mine of course!
If any fan wants to run a Trek show, then get seriously, stinking rich then you can produce whatever you want once you buy the rights. However, you might be the only person watching

Exactly!

 

[IMC Headquarters]

Give me Robert Lowery as Batman any day of the week over all the others.

Should fans run the show? Only if they agree to boldly take viewers where no one has gone before.

 

[Dar70]

Hells no. With The Fans in charge we would be back to twenty-six episodes of the same five regurgitated plotlines on a loop, because that's apparently what qualifies as True Star Trek according to The Fans. SNW would be shot on faithful replicas of the sets from The Cage with either doppelgangers of The Cage's cast or deepfakes of them. Hell, something like Picard S3 would probably be a best case scenario with The Fans in charge. Plus, they'd likely want to canonize the novels and STO, despite both contradicting each other.

Besides, even Gene Himself said Star Trek would be shit if fans were given authority over the franchise. And in this instance, He was right.

Haha....I think it would be worse then that. Fans can barely get along discussing the shows here. The production would be in complete chaos with a bunch of Trek nerds doing their best Spock Impersonations trying to impose their ideas of "logic" on each other....
Nothing would ever get made ...

 

[Dar70]

I chose no. While the current producers have not made the best decisions regarding the franchise since 2009. Fans would not be able to conduct themselves in a manner that a TV show would require. I would not be opposed to maybe have a fan or two as consultants.

 

[Starbreaker]

No. Fans shouldn't be allowed anywhere near the writing staff. Have you read fanfic?

 

[1001001]

No. Fans shouldn't be allowed anywhere near the writing staff. Have you read fanfic?

Exactly.