Fans, why did the ratings slide?

[Captain Fine]

I'd like to say ratings slid because s. 1 & 2 had no direction, so that turned people off. But the Xindi arc and the s. 4 mini-arcs didn't really help all that much, looking at the ratings. Maybe it was just too little too late. Personally, I really liked s. 3 and 4, although the Xindi arc didn't have to go on as long as it did.

I also liked the various Xindi species. I liked that they were so genetically similar, even though they looked so different. Humans and mice share similar amounts of DNA, yet are more different than the Xindi races. That said, I think the Xindi arc could have been halved. It did seem to go on a long time.

And Space Nazis were definitely dumb.

 

[Ro Boat]

This is somewhat of a crosspost, but the same points apply. I never watched ENT in its original run, but I love it now. I don't think I'm alone in this.

Something that does not get accounted for in these threads is age. I'm 29. I started watching Trek when my father rented the video of STIV. Then, I started watching TNG some time during the middle of the 1st season.

By the time DS9 hit its 4th or 5th season, I was in high school. I played sports, joined clubs, did homework. Thus, I devoted less time to Trek. I usually caught episodes in reruns.

By DS9's 6th and 7th seasons, I was in college and working. I had no time for TV. I never really completed DS9 until I watched the DVDs five years after the show had gone off the air.

I don't think I am the only one with a similar experience. Those who grew up on TNG saw their lives change. They didn't have as much time for Trek. I never saw any of VOY's last five seasons until DVDs. I didn't even live in the US for most of ENT's run. Now, I love ENT as my second favorite behind TNG.

Also, the cultural milieu switched from SciFi to Fantasy (Harry Potter et al.) in the late 90s. This made it a lot harder to pull in the eight year old fans and other young diehards as TNG had done.

I think that many of these issues play into the ratings far more than quality.

 

[Skywalker]

1) The early seasons were either too derivative (S1) or too boring (S2).
2) The latter seasons were either too serialized (S3) or too reliant on continuity (S4).
3) The then-Powers That Be had given up on Star Trek.
4) The franchise's overall popularity had been waning since the late '90s.
5) UPN was moving away from sci-fi action adventure shows (sadly).

Among other reasons.

 

[Screendoor]

I agree with Ro Boat. Many fans may not like Braga's style, but he is a smart writer that tries to avoid cliche. I think it's more that he was possibly new to writing character-based storylines and it may have seemed derivative. I like the direction the show was going in the first two seasons. I thought season three wasn't that good. Season four is what I think most fans wanted out of season one. Because season one wasn't what they expected, they cried that it sucked. But Berman and Braga aren't BAD writers, maybe less in touch with trends than they should be as writers for a popular tv show.

I think it had more to do with Harry Potter, Lord of the Rings, lost interest in sci-fi, etc.

 

[Mach5]

Mach5, I don't think you looked at the chart.

Think again. The decline of ratings over the 3 post ANiS weeks is steeper than the pre-ANiS 3 week incline.

As you can see from this chart, ANiS clearly harmed the ratings, and Marauders (being a complete piece of shit) didn't help matters either.

Carbon Creek being very good, caused the incline, which continued after (also very good) Minefield, and spiked after very very good "Dead Stop."

Then came the poor ANiS, and not only stopped the incline, but caused the severe decline.

 

[Skywalker]

And those were followed by The Seventh and The Communicator. Ouch.

 

[commodore64]

Mach5, I don't think you looked at the chart.

Think again. The decline of ratings over the 3 post ANiS weeks is steeper than the pre-ANiS 3 week incline.

As you can see from this chart, ANiS clearly harmed the ratings, and Marauders (being a complete piece of shit) didn't help matters either.

Carbon Creek being very good, caused the incline, which continued after (also very good) Minefield, and spiked after very very good "Dead Stop."

Then came the poor ANiS, and not only stopped the incline, but caused the severe decline.

So, what caused it to jump more than a million people?

 

[Penguin]

What caused it to jump more than a milion people?

The Possibbility of a naked T-Pol?

 

[Mach5]

What caused it to jump more than a milion people?

The Possibbility of a naked T-Pol?

Hehe, right on!

I mean, have you seen the promo? If i hadn't known better, I'd thought that it was a commercial for porn

 

[caisson2delta]

I was one of the few that knew when it was on, what time, and what channel. It did get preempted quite a bit, for basketball, in my market. It didn't get the kind of promotion that the other shows got and I think that hurt it tremendously. But I do remember that there was a lot of advertising for the Augment story arc, prior to it being released.

I don't know what day it aired around the country, but it originally aired on Wednesday nights at either 8 or 9 pm. That is a pretty tough slot to get people to watch when there are other shows on major networks. If it had been placed on a different day and time slot, it may have done much better. I was always of the opinion that it should've been on Sci Fi channel from the start and should've aired right before or after SG1.

 

[pookha]

the ratings slide for ds9 was actually greater.

one of the big things that hurt enterprise was how the ratings were done during the period of time it was on.
back then only the first showing was counted.
it didnt matter that showing was often preempted due to sports and there were reports that the weekend showing often got better ratings ,, that is the one that is counted.

with the way a shows ratings are calculated today i think the show would have had a better chance.

the awful writing of some of the early second season shows did seem to hurt and it was also the time period the show would start to be preempted.

there was a upswing in the early second season and then it went down.

there was another uptick in the later part of the third season , the end of the third season had a higher rating then the end of season 2.

but then they moved the show to friday night which has been really hard on broadcast tv shows.

there is an interesting footnote..
enterprise reruns several times beat first run shows on sci fi including battlestar galatica.

 

[commodore64]

What caused it to jump more than a milion people?

The Possibbility of a naked T-Pol?

Why didn't we see the same jump for Bounty or Harbinger?

I mean, have you seen the promo? If i hadn't known better, I'd thought that it was a commercial for porn

I say again, what about Bounty and Harbinger? You know what I think -- I think the promo attracted people who like Scott Bakula's work, might be interested in a captain and a crewmen (I tuned in again after a small hiatus) or heard a lot of buzz. I mean, despite the crapola that gets slung at this one, it did get nominated for a Hugo.

 

[Mach5]

it did get nominated for a Hugo.

Oh, I give up then. "A Night in Sickbay" was a great episode.

 

[TEH BABA]

it did get nominated for a Hugo.

Oh, I give up then. "A Night in Sickbay" was a great episode.

Evil Commie Bastard.

 

[Penguin]

Nominated for a Hugo?

So?

Lots of stories get nominated for a Hugo. Only a few win.

Being nominated doesn't mean it is a good story just that someone nominated it.

Writers who have won Hugo's had quality stories. some have won several Hugos. Asimov for instance.

If it had WON a hugo that would be a different story.

 

[Middleman]

it did get nominated for a Hugo.

Oh, I give up then. "A Night in Sickbay" was a great episode.

Absolutely! That's why it ranked #9 in TV.com's bottom 10 of Enterprise Episodes. Everyone loved it!

Somebody, anybody, where's my spoon??!!

 

[Mach5]

Where's my spoon!

A spoon... Do not try and bend the spoon. That's impossible. Instead... only try to realize the truth - there is no spoon. Then you'll see, that it is not the spoon that bends, it is only yourself.

 

[Penguin]

Asimov, Heinlein, Clark, all who won Hugos. their stories make ANIS look like the Crap it is.

Being nominated is nothing. Look at how many things get nominated for awards that didn't deserve the nomination but can say it had been nominated.

 

[Admiral Pike]

4) The franchise's overall popularity had been waning since the late '90s.

Maybe true to some extent, but TNGs last season was its highest rated, and First Contact also did really well in the theaters, yet DS9 and Voyager pretty much tanked from the start, especially so compared to TOS and TNG.
So it can't all be explained by that.
And also, what was it that made trek's popularity fall since 1993/1994/1995/1997? Of course part of the answer have to be found in the material itself.

To me it's very clear that it was a combination of degrading quality and lack of mainstream appeal that made star trek tank after TNG came off the air (and in DS9's case, since its first episode).

Examples of degrading quality:

• uninspired plots and rehashed storylines
• almost no thought-provoking conceptual science fiction (compared to TOS and TNG)
• the lack of any significant character development and
• overall lack of meaningful character drama.

The ways Trek failed in mainstream appeal:

• the endless technobabble (shields down to x per cent, invert the tachyon flow, modify the flux condensor etc)
• the canon saturated storylines (when you have to read the bloody Star Trek encyclopedia to know what's going on)
• boring and lame characters, that are neither very interesting, nor very relatable (Kim, Neelix, Tuvok, Hoshi, Mayweather, That guy from Quantum Leap, and no, having a dog doesn't make you interesting)
• the lack of sex*
• either too much (DS9, late ENT) or too little (VOY, early ENT) continuity
• bad pacing: long, slow, drawn out scenes with...
• ...overall way too much talk and too little action and plot progression.

[*By sex I mean both sexual tension between main characters (that makes the characters much more interesting to watch), as well as full-blown sex acts.]

 

[commodore64]

it did get nominated for a Hugo.

Oh, I give up then. "A Night in Sickbay" was a great episode.

Absolutely! That's why it ranked #9 in TV.com's bottom 10 of Enterprise Episodes. Everyone loved it!

Somebody, anybody, where's my spoon??!!

I would blame Mach5's phantom "rigging of the poll" squad. Vincent Van Gogh wasn't appreciated in his time either I still liked it.

Penguin, to my knowledge Carbon Creek is the only other ENT Hugo nomination. So ....

Evil Commie Bastard.

My name is multi-dimensional: a computer, a rank and a commie bastard.