Even then, with two seasons Prodigy has forty episodes, only ten less than Lower Decks will have with its five season run. So it still has a comparable level of content anyway.
Kurtzman on Any New Series Reaching 100 Episodes
- Thread starter Cr0sis21
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Grace and Frankie, 7 seasons, 94 episodes
And that's where the qualifier "That I know of," comes in handy.
The irony for me is for years it was often noted in retrospective interviews that TOS "only" ran for " 3 short years" and barely qualified for standard syndication .
Today, a meleniual looking back on TOS would not see a short run at 80 hours of television (when you include The Cage ) .
TOS lasted the equivalent of a show from today lasting 6 -8 seasons. I doubt any modern Trek series will reach 80 episodes let alone 100.
Today, a meleniual looking back on TOS would not see a short run at 80 hours of television (when you include The Cage ) .
TOS lasted the equivalent of a show from today lasting 6 -8 seasons. I doubt any modern Trek series will reach 80 episodes let alone 100.
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I don't actually know, but I feel as if TOS wouldn't have been perceived to have had a short run, back in the '70s and '80s. The only other space-based series with a similar run was Lost In Space, and its first season was B&W, which probably didn't help it in syndication. Which made TOS the go-to Space Show.
Perhaps not perceived as short insomuch that Sci fi in general had a tougher time and had shorter runs. But for TV shows in general, a 3 season run was definitely on the short side for that time period. Very few shows "naturally ended" in 3 seasons or reached a semblance of closure from a storyline perspective . Most series ending after 3 seasons or less was due to TPTB sacking it before the showrunners wanted it too.
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I'm a big believer in the 17 eps per Trimester per year.
Split the TV season into Trimesters or 3x 17-week sections.
1x Week is for X-mas/New Years.
Keep the modern "Actual 1-hour" content length and add in (Teaser or Prologue / Opening Credits / Main Content / Ending Credits / Epilogue / Next Time Preview or Teaser).
You have more than enough time for 1.5 Hrs worth of show with 20 minutes of commercials on top of the 1 hr run-time of REAL Content.
I have to disagree with Kurtzman's assessment of the longer seasons of the previous shows was a bad thing. Frankly, he came across as propping his era up by bringing the previous one down. That doesn't sit well with me.
As others have mentioned, the 'filler' episodes gave us a wider, lived on universe that we regularly play in. Because of the short seasons now, there's little time for breathing to allow the characters to really come alive and be loved by the viewers.
I get that a 20 or more episode season will never come again. But a happy medium of 15 or 16? I think that's a best of both worlds combination.
There's something else that's not being considered. The longer seasons also meant all those people... actors, writers, cameramen, set designers, etc... would have a guaranteed, steady paycheck for a much longer period of time. Considering how expensive cost of living has become, I personally would rather have a steady income from the same place for as long as possible, not scramble to find a new job every 4-6 months.
As others have mentioned, the 'filler' episodes gave us a wider, lived on universe that we regularly play in. Because of the short seasons now, there's little time for breathing to allow the characters to really come alive and be loved by the viewers.
I get that a 20 or more episode season will never come again. But a happy medium of 15 or 16? I think that's a best of both worlds combination.
There's something else that's not being considered. The longer seasons also meant all those people... actors, writers, cameramen, set designers, etc... would have a guaranteed, steady paycheck for a much longer period of time. Considering how expensive cost of living has become, I personally would rather have a steady income from the same place for as long as possible, not scramble to find a new job every 4-6 months.
I wouldn't go higher than 12 episodes for modern Trek . Actors like having flexibility these days to do other things . I also don't think the modern showrunners have enough creative juices to pull it off .
Having said that, more episodes for SNW is possible due to it's episodic format. But Anson Mount probably wouldn't want more. Which parallels Paramount profit margin budget anyway at limiting it to 10.
Having said that, more episodes for SNW is possible due to it's episodic format. But Anson Mount probably wouldn't want more. Which parallels Paramount profit margin budget anyway at limiting it to 10.
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The main issue I see with these shortened stories is that the stories are not well balanced. They are still learning how to balance the start, the middle, and the end. I have read and heard many times that these seasons start strong and fail to stick the landing at the end.
Someone mentioned syndication in the posts. This is why we had the longer seasons in the past. Syndication is no longer a thing. This is a good and bad thing. It is a good thing as the writers don't have to wear themselves out and end up with seasons that are weak, like TNG's 7th season, which had more clunkers than good episodes. On the other hand, in the bad, it means that these shows are not being as widely distributed and future generations may never know about them as access to them might be denied because they are no longer available to the public, see Prodigy until it was picked up by Netflix.
Someone mentioned syndication in the posts. This is why we had the longer seasons in the past. Syndication is no longer a thing. This is a good and bad thing. It is a good thing as the writers don't have to wear themselves out and end up with seasons that are weak, like TNG's 7th season, which had more clunkers than good episodes. On the other hand, in the bad, it means that these shows are not being as widely distributed and future generations may never know about them as access to them might be denied because they are no longer available to the public, see Prodigy until it was picked up by Netflix.
I'll put the weak season 7 of TNG against any season of Picard.
As opposed to the rest of us working the whole year, having enough vacation time for maybe a 2-3 weeks (if you have a good enough company or have been employed there a long, long time)? When those longer seasons were produced, it took around 9-10 months to shoot. That's 2-3 months off where they can do whatever they want.
I can't exactly call that terrible.
Lost in Space's 1st (B&W) season was a regular part of the series' syndication package in the 70s (on L.A. local stations such as KTTV) and the 80s/90s (the USA cable channel).
I was being sarcastic. Apologies if I didn't hit that button hard enough.
Most normal people work "Most of the year".
I'm a fan of "Fitting the Story" in the amount of episodes, if it takes 13, let it take 13, if it takes 8, same. However, I'm really not a fan of these 8-10 episode seasons, especially when they don't stick to decent episode lengths (looking at you Mando) Some ep are like 30 min others are over an hour. sheesh..
The Flash got it right at the end where they had a story, finished it, then moved on to another story. Also Flash and other arrow verse shows were still 20 episodes.
Sweet spot for me is 13. that means if you have 4 shows, that fills out the year.
As for the question of the thread? No. I don't think so, maybe an animated like prodogy that has 20 ep a season.. but a live action is a negative.
Also, if you remember Stargate Atlantis, it was 5 seasons, and at 5 seasons you have major renegotiations.. So the series would cost more to produce. But you also have Dwindling viewership. So if its still going strong, then you maybe could afford it, but I feel most would get 5 season, if that, and be done.
The Flash got it right at the end where they had a story, finished it, then moved on to another story. Also Flash and other arrow verse shows were still 20 episodes.
Sweet spot for me is 13. that means if you have 4 shows, that fills out the year.
As for the question of the thread? No. I don't think so, maybe an animated like prodogy that has 20 ep a season.. but a live action is a negative.
Also, if you remember Stargate Atlantis, it was 5 seasons, and at 5 seasons you have major renegotiations.. So the series would cost more to produce. But you also have Dwindling viewership. So if its still going strong, then you maybe could afford it, but I feel most would get 5 season, if that, and be done.
Television seems to be moving away from even that. Take the Walking Dead franchise for example, which had been doing sixteen episode seasons up until very recently, now six episodes a season is the norm, with a "deluxe season" consisting of twelve.
Okay, but look at the actual working days. A typical day filming a 90s Trek series went from 7am to 11pm. And they did that six days straight, took a day off, and then jumped into the next episode. Now imagine doing sixteen hours a day, six days a week for nine whole months. That is brutal. Plus it got even worse for the actors who played alien characters, they'd have to show up at 4am to start getting into makeup, and removal took at least two hours, which means they only really had time for three hours of sleep most of the time.
Yeah, there are reasons that shorter seasons are preferred these days.
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