Info from SF Ball about Trek '09 marketing

[Admiral Buzzkill]

There's an article on SciFiPulse by Ian M Cullen concerning Trek presentations at the SF Ball. The link to the full article is here.

There's a lot of interesting stuff there from a Paramount marketing person describing the research the studio did on Trek before starting up this film, and how it articulates with what Abrams is doing. I'll just quote a couple of the most interesting bits but the whole thing is worth reading.

Some of the findings [Chas Evens]revealed from the seven international markets...
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Representatives from one marketplace said that they were turned off from Star Trek because the FX was kind of cheesy, and they felt that the show took its self far to seriously. While representatives from another country felt there wasn’t enough skin on show in the movies. Australian moviegoers told Paramount that they would not go to see a Star Trek movie, for fear of being labelled as geeks and not cool.

So the research did turn up a number of reasons why much of the mainstream support has dropped away from the Star Trek Universe, and Paramount are hoping to bring that mainstream support back to Star Trek and retain the support of fans.

The research however has on occasion put the Paramount Executives at odds with J.J. Abrams. Because J.J. has a very a definite vision. Which means that the relationship between Paramount and Abrams regarding Star Trek is a very carefully choreographed balancing act, which involves a fair bit of give and take between Abrams and the Paramount executives who want to make a hit movie...
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Chas also revealed that a big meeting had been set up between execs and abrams for Tuesday to discuss when they plan to release the next trailer. The trailer spot, which Paramount would like is on Watchmen, which is released worldwide in March, but it seems unlikely to happen this close to the movies release.

So there's at least one more trailer, and they're trying to place it with a big release sometime in March. Cool.

 

[datas_cat_spot]

I am shocked Paramount would let the Watchmen opportunity slip away.

 

[Admiral Buzzkill]

Watchmen seems like a good fit if they're trying to reach the geek market.

Problem is, they already have the geek market sewn up. What they have to keep doing is reaching out to the rest of the g-ddamned world.

Watchmen may, after all, achieve wide success or it may tank - looks like an absolutely wonderful movie, but the breadth of its appeal is still hard to predict.

 

[datas_cat_spot]

I definitely agree about Watchmen's ability to reach the so far unreached. I was hoping for Trek to be attached to the first large budget movie of the year though. Monsters vs. Aliens will be at the end of the same month. We'll see what happens there.

 

[Tom Servo]

I am assuming that the cheesy comments about the VFX, and the show taking itself to seriously are concerning the original show, and not Abrams production. Am I correct in this assessment?

And a Star Trek trailer with Watchmen...do it.

 

[datas_cat_spot]

I am assuming that the cheesy comments about the VFX, and the show taking itself to seriously are concerning the original show, and not Abrams production. Am I correct in this assessment?

And a Star Trek trailer with Watchmen...do it.

Yes, I believe so. It was a good move to get a feel for these things before making the movie. Not that it's terribly surprising.

 

[Admiral Buzzkill]

I am assuming that the cheesy comments about the VFX, and the show taking itself to seriously are concerning the original show, and not Abrams production. Am I correct in this assessment?

It seems to have been the feedback that Paramount was getting about world perceptions of "Star Trek" prior to this production, period. Evidently they did some research before going ahead with a new project.

 

[Eric Cheung]

TrekMovie appears to have confirmed that a new trailer will be attached to Watchmen.

 

[Kelso]

they were turned off from Star Trek because the FX was kind of cheesy, and they felt that the show took its self far to seriously. While representatives from another country felt there wasn’t enough skin on show in the movies. Australian moviegoers told Paramount that they would not go to see a Star Trek movie, for fear of being labelled as geeks and not cool.

I wonder how much they paid for this information.

 

[datas_cat_spot]

TrekMovie appears to have confirmed that a new trailer will be attached to Watchmen.

Good to know. I hope this one includes a lot more dialog.