standalone episodes or serialized season for next TV series?

[Sindatur]

I think nowadays, you need to think long and hard about your arc and "Universe Building". Many shows don't make it past First Season (Or through the end of First Season for that matter), because they throw everything out all at once, and seem to go nowhere, and then by the end of the Season, they start to make things click and it really starts to show promise, but, it's already too late. And then of course you have the opposite, where you make the audience wait too long to see anything, because you're not throwing everything out all at once.

Writers to need to find a balance with introducing Arc elements and "Universe Building". One way, might be to do 2-3 Episode arcs, where you concentrate on one specific Arc element and end that 2-3 episode arc, with some real payoff, while making sure you you build your world through character development. Then tie all those 2-3 Episode arcs together at the end of the season.

Long seasons of 20+ episodes may be a detriment as well, as it gives the writers too much room for padding and dragging their heels on story development.

I'd personally like to see a station do a "wheel" format through the year. For example, TNT with Falling Skies, do 10-13 episodes a year, and follow that up with another show 10-13 epsiodes a year, followed by a 3rd and 4th show. By that time, you're back to Falling Skies next season and start voer again.

 

[Temis the Vorta]

But every different show in the wheel is a new opportunity to lose your audience. The number of people who like both X and Y is smaller than the number of people who like either X or Y. You can't afford to make the fans of X wait two years for their show to return. Ditto for Y. The more shows you add, the worse it gets.

Cable already has a wheel-ish structure, in that each 13-episode show is followed (ideally) by a compatible show taking over in the same timeslot, or just on the same channel - not at one year intervals, but just a few weeks, which won't strain anybody's patience. People are already used to waiting a year for their show to come back, and if some fans of X also like Y, that makes the wait seem even shorter.

As Breaking Bad was ending its run on AMC, we started seeing The Walking Dead ads. As The Walking Dead wraps up, we'll probably see some Mad Men ads. Creating families of shows like that is a great way to hang onto your audience, and as those shows demonstrate, they don't need to be in remotely the same genre.

AMC is adding to their family with 99 Stories, which sounds sci fi (might be fantasy skewing) and definitely is horror/suspense. So that's nicely compatible with The Walking Dead while being in a distinct genre. And they'll probably bring back their Western, Hell on Wheels, despite sketchy ratings.

An open-ended premise like TOS had is the safest bet. It's basically just "patrol and defense the frontier of the Federation and do Federation bidding (such as ferrying diplomats)." That leaves things very flexible for episodic and serialized stories mixed together, and a large range of

The one thing they shouldn't do is any actual science since that is boring. On TOS, they were always scanning some nebula at the very start of the episode, for about five seconds, and then the actual story began.

 

[Sindatur]

Where do you get waiting for 2 years for a show to return? There are 4, 13 Week periods in a year, so, therefore, if you do 10-13 episodes a show per year, that would be 4 shows, and a few weeks off for holidays.

So, each show would be running every year, in it's regular season. Falling Skies in Summer, and 3 other shows in Fall, Winter, and Spring.

What you are talking about, is exactly what I meant, but, of course, I would like it to be a SciFi wheel.

 

[xortex]

Like the two hands of a clock, it should be both. Episodic stories within a framework of a larger mysterious story premise concept that propels it and which may be unsolvable or lead to greater mysteries.

 

[CaptainMatt]

Stand-alones, although that seemes less likely with today's general audience. It seems everything has to be connected and serialised, and that just saddens me.

 

[Temis the Vorta]

Where do you get waiting for 2 years for a show to return? There are 4, 13 Week periods in a year, so, therefore, if you do 10-13 episodes a show per year, that would be 4 shows, and a few weeks off for holidays.

So, each show would be running every year, in it's regular season. Falling Skies in Summer, and 3 other shows in Fall, Winter, and Spring.

What you are talking about, is exactly what I meant, but, of course, I would like it to be a SciFi wheel.

Oh okay. What you're describing already exists on cable, but most cable channels don't define themselves by genre, which they don't need to do, as long as their audience sees and appreciates the commonalities.

AMC has Breaking Bad and The Killing in the summer, The Walking Dead and Hell on Wheels in the fall, more Walking Dead in the winter, and Mad Men in the spring. You could see a throughline there of "thought provoking quality drama" that cuts across genres. I don't like everything they do, but I do see their underlying philosophy - to deliberately gather many genres under their umbrella. They are adding a sci fi horror show, 99 Stories, which is yet another genre (though pretty close to TWD).

SyFy probably does have a "sci fi wheel" if you consider the shows they air to be sci fi and watchable. They program stuff year round, and you could watch that channel year round. Unlike AMC, I can't stand any of SyFy's programming, but presumably they know their audience and is good at making shows for them. I regard their lineup as "sci fi lite." If there was a "sci fi heavy" channel, I'd be there in a heartbeat.

 

[jefferiestubes8]

While the poll is closed most likely the new series will be serialized as it locks people into the CBSAA subscription the most.
What do you guys think?
Also Standalone pilot or cliffhanger at the end of the pilot?
Will we also get the narrator at the beginning of the episode like on two-parters saying "last time on Star Trek Voyager"...

 

[eyeresist]

I think it's pretty obvious the show will be serialised. However, I am guessing they will also have case-of-the-week episodes that just touch on the arc story, or maybe reflect its themes.

I don't think the pilot will have a cliffhanger, but it will certainly leave some crucial issues unresolved.

 

[jefferiestubes8]

After reading this today. I would not be surprised if serialized were the way they go on the new 2017 series. Also to keep subscriptions for the entire run.

Networks used to cringe at serialized shows because they did not lend themselves well to syndication. Out-of-order reruns can be confusing, so program developers preferred series such as CBS hits "The Big Bang Theory" or "NCIS," which wrap up a story in each episode.

U.S. networks are changing the way they develop and release new shows, and even commercials, as they seek to adapt to new TV viewing habits and profit from the "binge-watching" made popular by video streaming services like Netflix.

They make batches of current episodes available on-demand through cable boxes or online apps, and sell them later to the likes of Netflix.

Of Note CBS who has CBS All Access....

CBS Corp, meanwhile, is studying whether commercials themselves should be serialized to tell a story.

U.S. TV networks embrace 'binge-watching,' taking cue from Netflix

 

[Tesophius]

Definitely standalones, I've always found those to be the most interesting ones.

 

[jefferiestubes8]

Interesting NY Times article today:

“The innovation isn’t the 13-episode, seven-year show,” Mr. Landgraf said. “The innovation is fit the business model to the artist, not the artist to the business model.”

...making contained, 10-episode seasons with different casts has significantly expanded the talent available to him. John Travolta stars on this season of “American Crime Story,” and Mr. Murphy got him to sign on because it wasn’t an exhaustive commitment.

“You’re never going to get Jessica Lange or John Travolta or Kathy Bates to sign on the dotted line to give you seven years of their life doing the same character,” he said. “I don’t think that they’re interested in that. By doing these one-year talent deals, you’re allowing talent that wasn’t interested in television before to become part of it. Like Matthew McConaughey on ‘True Detective.’ ”

Anthology TV Can Draw Higher-Level Actors, FX Executive Says

Imagine if Trek 2017 series were an anthology series. Every season had a different ship and a different crew with 4 big name stars on the crew.

 

[JoeP]

I wonder if the fears of serialization (the viewer would have to have seen the other episodes to not be lost), is not as big an issue since all of the episodes are going to be available at all times. I could see that possibly being an issue with traditional on-the-air shows where unless you've PVR'd the whole run, you'd have to wait until a re-run, or read a synopsis online, but with streaming, if the episode you're watching doesn't make much sense, no problem. Back out, go to the main episode listing and start from the beginning. Right?

 

[eyeresist]

Imagine if Trek 2017 series were an anthology series. Every season had a different ship and a different crew with 4 big name stars on the crew.

I have been critical of the anthology idea, but now I could see it work if it was a "deluxe" product with big names, like True Detective or American Horror Story.

 

[Kor]

It should be an anthology in which the exact same ensemble of actors plays completely different characters in every episode, like a theater troupe.

Kor

 

[Tim Walker]

Interesting comments by Mr J on another thread (TOR.com argues episodic Star Trek would be better than story arcs?).

"nuWho (seasons 1 through 5 anyway) should be a model in terms of format I believe-you can get the best of both worlds with this approach. Individual episodes linked together by certain threads/themes but each of the individual stories building towards a sort of climax-but the individual episodes each have opportunities to be real stand-outs in terms of story telling".

 

[STEPhon IT]

Interesting NY Times article today:



Anthology TV Can Draw Higher-Level Actors, FX Executive Says

Imagine if Trek 2017 series were an anthology series. Every season had a different ship and a different crew with 4 big name stars on the crew.

Didn't Law & Order do something like that? One episode is one cast and the other ep. was a different one, I think it was Criminal Intent. It had a decent run.

 

[Mr. Laser Beam]

^ L&O used to do that all the time. They'd have crossovers between two series - the mothership and SVU, or SVU and Criminal Intent, or SVU and Trial By Jury, etc. (They've never had all L&O series do a linked story though.)

 

[OpenMaw]

It's really not accurate to call this thing a TV show anyway. Things that are being created now with streaming services in mind have a lot of differences in production and format from classic TV.

Most likely, Star Trek will have some form of serialization, because that's how 90% of shows are these days. Will it be flow from one episode to another in terms of plotting and such? That is hard to say, but if you look at a show like "The Expanse" that's really how a science fiction show done for a streaming service is going to be done in the 21st Century. So i'd wager it'll feel, in terms of the way the story is told, like that.

 

[Tim Walker]

I was thinking about a comment that startrekwatcher made, about a series of Circle like trilogies.

Consider the first three Star Wars movies produced-The New Hope, The Empire Strikes Back, and The Return of the Jedi.

These three movies formed a trilogy, of sorts. But unlike The Lord of the Rings (but similar to the nuWho mentioned), each is to a significant extent a self contained story.

 

[STEPhon IT]

It's really not accurate to call this thing a TV show anyway. Things that are being created now with streaming services in mind have a lot of differences in production and format from classic TV.

Most likely, Star Trek will have some form of serialization, because that's how 90% of shows are these days. Will it be flow from one episode to another in terms of plotting and such? That is hard to say, but if you look at a show like "The Expanse" that's really how a science fiction show done for a streaming service is going to be done in the 21st Century. So i'd wager it'll feel, in terms of the way the story is told, like that.

This is new territory because I'm used to the series' episodes' Act end with a fade to black, but streaming shows are designed more like premium TV shows where there's no signal to break for commercials. This new series episodes will be treated like short films, it'll be interesting to see the comparison from the pilot broadcast on CBS and the one presented on pay service.
I'm also wondering if the series will be in the same format as the rest of the Trek shows, and CBS will eventually release the 1st season series, maybe 4 years later, on MTV or 1 of CBS television channels on cable?
None this matters if the show isn't good, and gets poor reviews/viewership from subscribers.