Then again - if it's just a matter of opinion, you can't say they should be trying to be more entertaining because that's impossible.
You're relying on your subjective opinion whilst dismissing other people's opinions because they are subjective.
Poll Do you consider Discovery to truly be in the Prime Timeline at this point?
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You're relying on your subjective opinion whilst dismissing other people's opinions because they are subjective.
Not exactly. They are trying to find what entertains the most people because that is their business, and largely has been from day 1 one Star Trek.
I am not dismissing other people's opinions. Rather, I am noting that there is a variety of opinions, and a categorical statement of "It's not entertaining" is falling flat because there are people who find it entertaining.
Then the show is likely an objective failure at being entertaining, in that sense. Though it's hard to know for sure since they won't tell us how many people watch it (and of course it's only an unknown subset of that who are actually entertained by it.)
What? They’re making new episodes of VOY?
Goodness me. So on the one hand you say they are "trying to find what entertains the most people", yet when I respond to that you assert that it is not a failure because it entertained you personally.
Brilliant.
Speaking for myself:
TOS: Watched it in syndication as a kid in the late 70s and early 80s. I found it entertaining as a child the same way I found Lost in Space, the Brady Bunch, the Andy Griffith Show, and Gomer Pyle entertaining, ie as suitable entertainment for me as a child, but as I grew older, I recognized how cheaply made it was (not the Enterprise necessarily, but the single color backdrops and obvious stages used for alien planets). My real passion was Doctor Who, specifically Tom Baker's Doctor Who. It was fun. TOS, though, for their lack of realistic, well, anything (Giant space hand? Giant Space Lincoln? Space babies? Space hippies?), had the most naturalistic performances in Star Trek. I really warmed to the big three as characters.
The movies: I saw TMP in the theater at around 7 years old. Bored me to tears. Cool visuals though. Then came 2-4. This was a brilliant, layered, connected Space Saga. The Connie refit is still my favorite Trek ship, those movie uniforms still my favorite movie uniforms. It is those movies that connected me to Trek. My other favorites are 6, First Contact, and the entire nuTrek series, including Into Darkness. Yes, I said it.
TNG: Because of my love of the movies, watched every episode. I never connected with the 1701-D, she always looked too lopsided, not graceful at all. But here is where the cracks started to show again. The performances were so formal. No one I know spoke like that.
DS9-Ent: More of the same. Same cinematography. Same effects. Same formal almost wooden performances. Same music. Same technobabble solutions. For 700+ episodes. I understand DS9 is better than I gave it credit for, but supposedly that improvements happens in season 3, and so I have to slog through 50 hours of same to get to the improvement. I've never made it through season 2, I just get bored. Enterprise? I watched the first season and part of the second (I LOVED the pilot) and tapped out of more of the same. I checked back in at the beginning of seasons 3 and 4 when we were promised something different, but it was more of the same. I loved the Augment arc at the beginning of season 4, but that was mostly because of Brent Spiner's performance. The rest of the season was basically "Enterprise... but with more callbacks!"
So mostly I love the TOS movies. That's the Star Trek I enjoy the most. And part of that is, yes, I love ship porn. I love the movie era ship designs so much.
And while I would argue that a lot of what you call lowest common denominator isn't, here is the cold hard truth: Star Trek on television has been in ratings freefall ever since Deep Space 9. Star Trek isn't inspiring anybody because nobody but hardcore fans watch it. So CBS has 2 choices: Not air Star Trek for an increasingly dwindling fanbase, or try to win new viewers by trying something new. We can disagree how successful they were at trying something new, but had they put up another season of the same stuff they put up before, they would just be servicing an ever shrinking fanbase, and that isn't a recipe for profit.
You're confused. fireproof78 said that. This is the second time you've done that.
Ah, my apologies.
It is difficult for that objective standard to be measured. Unfortunately.
I mean, if we want to get very technical, we could start a poll here and ask who found DISCO entertaining. What that prove anything? It still didn't entertain you, personally, so, by that measure, it is a failure.
Spock served in the Romulan war, that took place before he was born?Except Spock served during the war, and I doubt such a huge technological leap could be kept quiet.
Bill was referring to the Klingon war.Spock served in the Romulan war, that took place before he was born?
ok thanks
I actually don't do any of these things.
TOS was first and foremost an action show. Roddenberry's own words in the Writer's Guide. TOS was never meant to be utopian. Indeed, their goal was to show a better world, not a perfect one. There were still flaws with humanity.
I have a feeling you will start liking Discovery more when the next Trek series comes along.
Exactly. Often times the TNG styled utopia is used as the standard by which all Trek series fail.
I have a feeling you will start liking Discovery more when the next Trek series comes along.
I think I saw someone actually call Kelvin Trek "Real Trek" after seeing DISCO...
I know, I was shocked too.
Yeah, imho, TNG should not be the standard by which all other Treks are judged.
I'll ignore it because it's obvious they are lying. (like they've done, non-stop)
First and foremost they view Discovery as its own thing and it's own universe, this is how they've crafted it, this is how they talk about it 90% of the time even throughout that awful After Trek show, they then claim afterwards it's Prime because merchandising. That is all.
If Discovery was Prime Timeline, why wasn't it planned from the get go to fit into the Prime Timeline and why, even by their own admission, do they have to wait till S2 to start fitting it into Prime? It makes no sense, it shows they viewed canon and setting as a distant afterthought.
Here is the problem, you don't have to dumb everything down to absolute garbage to make it popular, this argument has NEVER held true because intelligent science fiction has always been popular. One of the most popular shows is Black Mirror which is vastly more intellegent than Discovery, The Expanse is massively popular, good science fiction movies are very popular, in fact movies like The Martian or Arrival pulled more money in than the Kelvin films.
Another point is The Orville, consistently has far higher audience scores than Discovery's mediocre audience scores, rated highly on US TV and has a viewership in the US at least, most likely dwarfing Discovery's numbers. From the number crunching done here before, despite being a global show, it's quite likely that Discovery is actually the least watched Star Trek show by quite some margin.
The idea that an actual Star Trek show wouldn't be popular, in an era where Science Fiction is actually on the upwards, doesn't hold water to me at all, all the evidence is stacked against the argument.
Franchise fatigue I believe is really what killed Star Trek in the end, but it's been over a decade since ENT and The Orville shows people want Star Trek again.
How does the timeline affect merchandising?
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