Spin off of Trek in general, not Discovery specifically.
Alex Kurtzman Gets New Deal With CBS, Will Expand 'Star Trek' TV
- Thread starter Lawrence B
- Start date
- Status
To be clear, I'm not arguing that there's any evidence to claim that CBS considers Discovery a failure. But I do think, for reasons I outlined upthread, they really had little choice but to double down on more Trek whether or not Discovery met their expectations.
They had the choice. They always have the choice. They just erred on taking another risk. I just don't think that, unless corporate attitudes have changed that much, they would just keep shoving money at it. One series? Maybe. 5? I find that odd.
Again, CBS is trying to pivot both to younger viewers and to having a financially viable streaming platform. As far as I can ascertain, they have no "plan B" for CBS All Access. We know Discovery brought in a lot of subscribers, but undoubtedly a large number canceled as soon as the season was over. So CBS knew Trek fans would sign up, and knew they needed to come up with more Trek original content to keep them subscribed 12 months out of the year. Canceling Discovery with no new show in production would basically mean forgoing this revenue stream - and the chance to bootstrap themselves to a Netflix/Amazon competitor - for at least a few years. It's hard to see how that's in their interest. Better to try and tweak Discovery than to through their entire streaming platform strategy in the dumpster.
I'm not sure how that disputes what I said. But, that's fine. I think CBS putting more money up and considering several options shows more confidence, not just finding a "Plan B."
Let's see what comes out of this.
Right now this reads as damage control, given the suspicious timing. The showrunners are fired and there are massive problems behind the scenes, so CBS releases this news.
Reminds me of the way WB handles it's press for the DCEU. Just announce a bunch of projects to counter-program the negative headlines. We'll see if any of these actually materialize.
Right now this reads as damage control, given the suspicious timing. The showrunners are fired and there are massive problems behind the scenes, so CBS releases this news.
Reminds me of the way WB handles it's press for the DCEU. Just announce a bunch of projects to counter-program the negative headlines. We'll see if any of these actually materialize.
Reads more like Kurtzman leveraged his new position to get a sweet five series deal out of CBS. The timing makes perfect sense if the other projects were part of the bargain for taking over showrunner duties.
Of course they had a choice, they could have pulled the plug, the existing Star Trek fanbase isn't so important that they have to get us no matter what. I could see them giving Discovery a second season if it wasn't a success because there are examples of shows becoming a success after the first year but doubling (or in this case quadrupling) down in the franchise? No, just no. That makes no sense whatsoever to me, in which reality is developing four or five more shows a sign of failure?
If we know that why are we arguing if it was a success or not?
Amazon was a growing business. It did not turn a profit because it kept investing by branching into new areas first in the available products and then into services and media and now acquisitions while still being a shitbag greedy company that first grew by essentially pocketing billions by not collecting sales tax, and now fighting over a measly 25 million tax while Bezos earns 10x that in a month. It was never a failure, it just turned what would have been profits into investments and is now pretty much a monster that feels the need to coerce customers into getting Prime by holding their orders hostage for 8 days.
CBSAA is just an entry into online for CBS which is, unimaginatively, a parallel to Amazon Prime Video. Trek helped them and was successful enough to garner more investment. They have a deal with Netflix to subsidize the costs and brought in considerable money in subscriptions. It is not a financial failure. It was clearly good enough to warrant developing both a second season and other options that may turn into another series. The worst it could be financially is not yet profitable, but will be profitable after X episodes and Y years if things consider on this trajectory with some margin for error. I suspect things are better than that especially with the international streaming rights. I also think there is a secondary effect here as well. New Trek creates new fans and buzz and demand for old Trek so the value of the entire library is growing.
CBS sees the writing on the wall, and knows broadcast TV is dying. It doesn't want to sign a deal with someone like Netflix or Amazon (or even Hulu) because it understands the end-result of this would be CBS reduced to running a production studio and being a virtual shadow of itself in a decade or two. In order to survive it needs to have a successful streaming platform. In order to have a successful streaming platform it needs native content. Right now, Star Trek is the most lucrative native content it can offer.
Last edited:
It has a deal with both of them. Admittedly the Amazon one just makes it easy to add CBS into your prime options. I think honestly that's what CBS is up to. They can never sell as many all access subscriptions as they probably can as a premium rider to Prime. But to make that really work they need a lot of content and they needed it last year.
Well, this one promises to be decent, maybe:
And it's NOT directed by Michael "Which beloved franchise shall I ruin next" Bay
Last edited:
I do wonder if the make-up will be quietly phased out? All that we've seen to this point will be explained as part of some body modification sect/fad.
There's been some cryptic tweets from the production staff that the discrepancy with earlier Trek "will be explained."
Also, with Fuller and Harberts gone, everyone who thought the redesign is a good idea had departed.
"We do not discuss it with outsiders."
Honestly, a slight modification would be enough: Just add hair and beards. And for future klingons, just maaaybe put a little less thick layer of latex on their face.
They could even sell it as an "upgrade" in make-up technique!
- Status
Similar threads
