I mean, isn't S31 essentially a DISCO movie?
Spoilers General Disco Chat Thread
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I mean, isn't S31 essentially a DISCO movie?
The only Disco connection is that Georgiou is in it. Otherwise, there's no connection to Disco as it's set in the early 24th century with Rachel Garrett in it.
I mean, basically all of the Star Trek shows have been separate things from a writing perspective, with only a little bit of crossover. Mostly Kurtzman and Goldsman, who jump around quite a bit. Kirsten Beyer wrote for both DIS and PIC. Oh, and Katheryn Lyn jumped from Lower Decks to SNW, but she's friggin awesome (judging by her episodes) and deserves all the credit.
Admittedly, Kurtzman is listed as co-showrunner for Starfleet Academy, along with Noga Landau. Given how its worked in the past, I wouldn't be surprised if he has a story credit (with or without Jenny Lumet, his writing partner) for the pilot episode, which is a big bombastic event, and then he nopes out of the show to do his Rick Berman thing.
It's pretty clear that the tone in Discovery has been set by Michelle Paradise since season 3. Actually, before that, since episodes from late Season 2 penned by her, like Project Daedalus and Such Sweet Sorrows show the attention to emotion that came to define later Discovery. She won't be involved, hence I think there's little chance of it having DIS vibes.
Yeah, if you look at Kurtzman's writing credits for all current live action shows, it's not a lot
With the exception of Such Sweet Sorrow, every Kurtzman credit has been setting up a show and/or season of Discovery. Even that could be seen as "setup" in a way, since it paved the way for both Season 3 of DIS, and SNW.
But the general impression is Kurtzman likes to set up a scenario, then turn it over to other writers to figure out. Which is a pretty good role for an EP, to be honest.
Berman didn't have a lot of credits, either. (Until ENT, anyway. And those were always with Brannon Braga at the minimum. I suspect Braga did most of the heavy lifting for those.) Except where noted, all of his credits were 'story by' along with others. From my memory...
TNG...
"Brothers" (sole writer)
"Ensign Ro"
"Unification I"
"Unification II"
"A Matter Of Time" (sole writer)
DS9...
"EMISSARY"
"THE MAQUIS, PART I"
"THE MAQUIS, PART II"
VOY...
"CARETAKER"
"HOPE AND FEAR"
"TIMELESS"
"THINK TANK"
"EQUINOX"
"EQUINOX, PART II"
"FURY"
"ENDGAME"
ENT... (*=written by Berman and Braga)
"BROKEN BOW"*
"FIGHT OR FLIGHT"*
"STRANGE NEW WORLD"
"UNEXPECTED"*
"TERRA NOVA"
"THE ANDORIAN INCIDENT"
"SHADOWS OF P'JEM"
"SHUTTLEPOD ONE"*
"FUSION"
"ROGUE PLANET"
"ACQUISITION"
"OASIS"
"DETAINED"
"VOX SOLA"
"FALLEN HERO"
"DESERT CROSSING"
"TWO DAYS AND TWO NIGHTS"
"SHOCKWAVE"*
"CARBON CREEK"
"SHOCKWAVE, PART II"*
"A NIGHT IN SICKBAY"*
"MARAUDERS"
"THE SEVENTH"*
"THE COMMUNICATOR"
"VANISHING POINT"*
"PRECIOUS CARGO"
"STIGMA"*
"THE CROSSING" (teleplay and story with Braga)
"COGENITOR"*
"BOUNTY"
"THE EXPANSE"*
"THE XINDI"*
"CARPENTER STREET"*
"HARBINGER"
"AZATI PRIME"
"ZERO HOUR"*
"THESE ARE THE VOYAGES..."*
I may be missing one or two episodes, but I am certain about these. Considering the Berman era had at least twice as many episodes produced each year in comparison to the Kurtzman era, I'd actually say Kurtzman put his stamp on just as many episodes as Berman, percentage wise. Until ENT, anyway... he had double the credits there than all the other shows combined. Take out his ENT credits, and he was credited with only about 3% of the episodes.
Berman: 38 episodes out of 624, about 6% of the total episodes
Kurtzman: 8 episodes out of 113 live action (don't know if he will be credited for either of the final two DISCO episodes, so I didn't count those in the total), about 7% of the total episodes
TNG...
"Brothers" (sole writer)
"Ensign Ro"
"Unification I"
"Unification II"
"A Matter Of Time" (sole writer)
DS9...
"EMISSARY"
"THE MAQUIS, PART I"
"THE MAQUIS, PART II"
VOY...
"CARETAKER"
"HOPE AND FEAR"
"TIMELESS"
"THINK TANK"
"EQUINOX"
"EQUINOX, PART II"
"FURY"
"ENDGAME"
ENT... (*=written by Berman and Braga)
"BROKEN BOW"*
"FIGHT OR FLIGHT"*
"STRANGE NEW WORLD"
"UNEXPECTED"*
"TERRA NOVA"
"THE ANDORIAN INCIDENT"
"SHADOWS OF P'JEM"
"SHUTTLEPOD ONE"*
"FUSION"
"ROGUE PLANET"
"ACQUISITION"
"OASIS"
"DETAINED"
"VOX SOLA"
"FALLEN HERO"
"DESERT CROSSING"
"TWO DAYS AND TWO NIGHTS"
"SHOCKWAVE"*
"CARBON CREEK"
"SHOCKWAVE, PART II"*
"A NIGHT IN SICKBAY"*
"MARAUDERS"
"THE SEVENTH"*
"THE COMMUNICATOR"
"VANISHING POINT"*
"PRECIOUS CARGO"
"STIGMA"*
"THE CROSSING" (teleplay and story with Braga)
"COGENITOR"*
"BOUNTY"
"THE EXPANSE"*
"THE XINDI"*
"CARPENTER STREET"*
"HARBINGER"
"AZATI PRIME"
"ZERO HOUR"*
"THESE ARE THE VOYAGES..."*
I may be missing one or two episodes, but I am certain about these. Considering the Berman era had at least twice as many episodes produced each year in comparison to the Kurtzman era, I'd actually say Kurtzman put his stamp on just as many episodes as Berman, percentage wise. Until ENT, anyway... he had double the credits there than all the other shows combined. Take out his ENT credits, and he was credited with only about 3% of the episodes.
Berman: 38 episodes out of 624, about 6% of the total episodes
Kurtzman: 8 episodes out of 113 live action (don't know if he will be credited for either of the final two DISCO episodes, so I didn't count those in the total), about 7% of the total episodes
I agree that is a good role for an executive producer.
Berman also was there for the setup of important parts... DS9 and VOY pilots, Spock and the Bajorans' first appearance for TNG, the Maquis setup. But he did add a few during VOY's run, mostly being either an 'event' like the show's 100th episode or a season finale/premiere. It's ENT where he really has the bulk of his credits. I don't know if this was him wanting to be more hands on for his own reasons or if this was more due to UPN and the suits. He was definetely the most hands off with DS9, to the benefit of that show.
It's totally obvious.
The executives have only approved ongoing shows that are Discovery spinoffs. It's clear they want that to continue and not anything else.
By Discovery finishing in the top 10 Neilsons more than Picard, it confirms this decision, which I assume was already based on their numbers.
Or a reflection of the fact that Kurtzman was officially the acting showrunner for the second half of S2.
My impression has always been that after whatever happened with Berg and Harbert's firing, Kurtzman threw out the original plans for the Red Angel and came up with the Control stuff as a mid-season retcon. I say this because we know that production paused after The Sound of Thunder for awhile. We also know from Berg/Harberts interviews they intended a "science versus faith" theme for the season, and said that Spock was not going to be seen as an adult. In addition, the Red Angel looked way, way different in the first few episodes of the season, and Pike made comments suggesting he was religious which were never followed up on.
My supposition was always that once they were fired, the ex-showrunners would have been owed money for story credit, if nothing else, if they finished up their plot arc. So Kurtzman pulped it mid season, coming up with an entirely new plot idea that never quite gelled properly. But it required a lot of heavy lifting to fix, nonetheless.
Remains to be seen, but doubtful. Just because it has Georgiou doesn't make it a DIS movie. Pretty sure it'll be a distinct thing. It's also kind of a leftover from the bygone (so soon!) heyday of streaming Trek (thanks to financial troubles).
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Ok, if you say so!
Why was he so much more heavily involved with the writing of Enterprise?
If this is true, I hope that someday there is a behind-the-scenes book released that gives us a look at what the second half of the season was originally going to be.
Rumors suggest scenes of Pike being a devout Catholic and praying before a battle were shot but then binned as well.
Maybe because it was the first time after GR's passing that there was only one Star Trek series on the air while nothing else was in development (exception for NEM, but his teleplay credits diminish over the arc of season 1)? Might have been different if Joe Menosky came over to ENT as well, as Braga was used to having an episode writing partner while also day to day showrunning.
Come to think of it, Ira Behr always had a writing partner episode to episode while also serving as DS9 showrunner.
I know that there were writing staff retention issues with season 1 and 2. Other than Berman and Braga, these people were on the writing staff at one point or another during season 1: Mike Sussman, Phyllis Strong, Andre Bormanis, Chris Black, Antoinette Stella, Maria and Andre Jacquematton, Fred Dekker, Tim Finch, Stephen Beck. Except for Sussman, Strong, Bormanis, and Black, ALL of them were gone by the end of season 1. (And Chris Black was the only newcomer to the franchise that stuck around... Sussman, Strong, and Bormanis came over from VOY.)
I know they were strapped for writers when season 2 was gearing up, but they were able to get John Shiban from THE X-FILES. (It just ended at that time.) And David A. Goodman was brought on midseason.
I wonder if that was a reason he was working with the writing staff as much as he was during those 2 seasons... he and Braga were less of a presence for season 3, and they were both basically hands off for season 4, except the finale.
That would be my first guess, but...
... this paints a pretty gruesome picture. The turnover for ENT S1's writing staff probably rivals TNG S1's.
I'm starting to think this was exactly the case for ENT S1-S2. As far as Season 3 and still having a hand, although less? ENT S3 was their "do or die" season, so he naturally still would've wanted to not entirely let go of the wheel.
With S4, he knew the writing was on the wall, but he also knew ENT would have the number of episodes it needed for syndication. So, he could afford to check out.
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VOY season 6 was the first season of the franchise to be alone on tv with new episodes. ENT wasn't starting any development until season 7 of VOY, which is when Braga stepped down and Biller took over that writing staff.
You raise a good point about Braga and Behr... when they started overseeing things, their single credits were either significantly reduced or gone altogether. This is especially true of Ira Steven Behr... I believe the last episode he had sole writer credit was "THE JEM'HADAR", the season 2 finale. (Or season 3 episode 2, "THE SEARCH, PART II", since he was the sole teleplay credit, but he did share story credit with Robert Hewitt Wolfe. Depends on how you look at it.) Wolfe was his partner, then it was Hans Beimler when Wolfe left at the end of season 5.
Braga and Menosky started writing episodes together at the beginning of season 3, but Braga didn't really take the reigns until season 4. "PREY" was his last solo writer credit for VOY. From season 4 onward (except for "PREY"), he always had a writing partner, almost always being Joe Menosky. (Once in a while, he would get in a solo story credit, like "WARHEAD" or "MEMORIAL".)
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