Oh it absolutely would have.
60 million dollar production cost for 20 episodes that can be sold off to various cable networks to recoup a portion of it's costs a few years after it's streaming debut would make it's money back so easily it's amazing that they went the direction they did with things.
The 7 stages of cope.
Okay, and? You must have missed my next post where I clarified that I wasn’t saying that I expect Starfleet Academy to become a cult phenomenon. I’m not saying “Look, the show is cancelled, too, just like the original, and that means it will be remembered as a global cult classic soon”. No, that would be silly. But it remains true that both shows — the original and SFA — didn’t meet studio expectations. That’s it, that’s all I wanted to say. TRON JA307020 was commenting on how unfortunate it was that the 60th anniversary of Trek started with the cancellation of the newest show. And I was merely pointing out that that’s a fact that both shows have in common. It doesn’t follow that that means I expect SFA to become as big and culturally significant as the original.
Some people want to act like the fact that the show didn’t get the numbers the studio expected it to get and was cancelled is somehow the ultimate “proof” that the show isn’t any good. Well, that just doesn’t follow. Both because there’s just too many other factors that contributed to the cancellation that have little to do with the show itself (the streaming platform it ran on, the negative reactions to preceding Trek outings, the unrealistic expectations from studios, the changing studio leadership et al). But also because my personal enjoyment or assessment of any given media item isn’t affected by how well it performed or how many other people liked it. There’s simply no way to “prove” to me that what I like about the setting, the characters, the style and the writing, was “actually” all bad and the cancellation proves it. It’s kinda sad to see how much some people have apparently been craving the news of this cancellation (something the most reasonable people have been expecting from even before the show premiered), because they somehow feel vindicated in their negative assessment of the show by it.
I personally would say, yes, that’s what can reasonably be called a financial flop. And I’m not under some illusion that the show is actually some sleeper hit (as some detractors seem to think about those who “defend” the show). I don't see anyone claiming that secretly the viewership numbers for the show were awesome and that they only cancelled it because of studio politics. But since when does the fact that something is a financial flop mean it won’t find its dedicated fandom? Or that it is actually bad? This just doesn’t add up. And the people who so desperately want for the cancellation to somehow be evidence that the show is “bad, actually”, can’t seem to fathom people who are liking a show despite it tanking financially.
How grand for you. Your keen eyes perceive a truth the rest of us are blind to.
You're still hanging out here, though. We must not be that bad.
I wouldn't consider it to be a flop. Who knows what was in the script for S2? It could be spectacular. Or a total failure, we won't know until next year.
I'd suggest the real reason for the cancellation of SFA and SNW has more to do with Paramount's financial shakeups than any creative decisions.
Which brings me back to a point I've made several times: as much as I love what Star Trek is doing with it's "1 episode is 1 movie" visuals, it's easier to justify renewing a $50m/season show vs a $100m/season show. Then again, with LD's cancellation 2 years ago, it seems that Star Trek in general is on the chopping block no matter how good/bad/expensive the show is.
At least they're committed to letting SNW finish it's five seasons.
And they almost didn't even get that.
Trek pales next to the $400 million Netflix spent on Stranger Things S5.
True. However, there are some other major differences: a lot more viewers, much more marketing, merchandise tie-ins, etc.
Which was probably because they already had contractual obligations in place and it would have cost more to cancel it then it would have to go through with things
Netflix is historically horrible at keeping production costs down.
Unfortunately merchandising potential kind of sucks for Star Trek's 32nd century since the majority of people only really seem to want stuff from the 23rd and 24th century's.
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Tell that to Playmates.
If I could walk into my local geek shop and see an Eisenberg class model I would be so sold. The 32nd century is a beautiful time period.
Any Star Trek merch is just so hard to find even venturing to the bigger cities there are barely any mugs or tshirts. Maybe a few combadges.
Any Star Trek merch is just so hard to find even venturing to the bigger cities there are barely any mugs or tshirts. Maybe a few combadges.
Playmates newest run was three Discovery figures, a re-release of some old tng/tos stuff, and a half completed Prodigy line that was killed off at about the same time as they pulled the plug on Prodigy.
So,people are not buying 23/24 century stuff?
You eat em!
Agree with you on the 32nd century ships. I'm gutted I missed out on the eaglemoss replicas.
Also agree on trek merch. In Melbourne we have a very large pop culture store called Minotaur. Their Star trek section takes up half a shelf which it shares with Dr who. The Stars Wars merch on the other hand has like three full bookshelves dedicated to the novels then another couple for all the pop funkos and another row of metal shelving for the models and action figures. The trek shelf is rarely updated with new stock and literally has items that have been there for years. It's a pretty sad state of affairs.
Forbidden Planet is our biggest one and it's exactly the same as that
Forbidden Planet is the go-to store for a lot of UK Star Wars collectors I follow on YouTube.
Star wars stuff is all over, lots of anime merch. A whole section devoted to whatever is the flavour of the month and often gets rotated out for the next shiny new thing that gets popular. Lots and lots of funko pops. Maybe half a shelf of Kirk, Spock and Picard action figures shared with a couple of different Doctors Who.
There's a guy I follow who always finds great figures for clearance prices. 5 pounds or sometimes even less and I've thought to myself, "Forbidden Planet has better sales than American Walmarts of Targets do!"
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