I hope you're right about it not being a problem with Discovery. I do get the sense that both plot and characters will be important.
I hope Discovery places "plot" first, avoids melodrama
- Thread starter INACTIVEUSS Einstein
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There are very different expectations in the audience. For comedies, if you're laughing, the comedy is succeeding regardless of anything else. You don't need plot or even great characters. Although, those can help. But, look at skits, they often don't flesh out the characters or have much of a plot but can be hilarious.
Yeah, but as I said, it's not just comedy that does that. Drama does as well.
Shruggles. I'm not going to get into a debate about this but there are different expectations between comedy and drama.
But, I do agree that what works as drama varies by person. I've only said that I prefer drama where plot is important *and* characterization is excellent. If it doesn't have both, it's not good drama in my book.
Melodrama is cheap. And, a strong plot with cardboard characters isn't fun either. If it doesn't have both, I'm out. YMMV.
Every single example I gave in the previous post was a dramatic play, not a comedy. I understand tastes are different. That's not the point. I'm just saying that it's just a fact that lots of dramas have successfully employed the format of minimal plot and maximum character and dialogue. You may prefer one over the other, I didn't even say whether I prefer those specific plays over others, but that doesn't mean that such plays haven't found critical and commercial success.
I'd have to disagree. Good Star Trek is about the characters and situation. The SciFi is there to propel and support that. It's background and not at the forefront. A story like the Naked Time isn't about finding a cure for the virus, its about what happens when control is stripped away and our emotions and inner selves are laid bare. Very little time is actually spent on virus, just enough to establish what it is and what it does. The real plot is how our characters deal with the effects of the virus while trying to save the ship.
Like I said, what works for one person may not work for another, and that's just fine. In drama, if it doesn't have both a solid plot *and* excellent characterization, I'm out!
I'm not trying to say what works for everyone. So, it's nice those examples worked out, but, from what you say, it sounds like they're not my cup of tea.
JMS said A LOT of things during the B5 run that turned out to be just plain false:
- That Sinclair leaving was 'always planned' (No, it wasn't.)
- That he's never change the flow or pace of the story if he didn't get 5 seasons (again false in that when he found PTEN was folding and he probably would get a 5th season he fast-tracked and compressed the remander of what would have been Seasons 4 and 5 INTO Season 4. When TNT said, "Hey we'll give you that final 5th season JMS was "Well, that's great,but what the hell do I do now? And the result WAS that ridiculous mess that was B5's 5th season.)
- Claudia Christian asked to leave (Again, just not true.)
Actually it was, while the timetable was moved up a bit due to the actors illness season 3 was always when the first episode build up was set to pay off in concerns to Sinclare going back in time to become Valen and being written out of the show.
Maybe you should read her book...
Because she's the one who tried to hold out on renewing her contract to get a better deal and JMS just wasn't willing to play her game.
^^^
I did better than that - I spoke to her directly at a Ren Faire I was working in 1998 (She was a big Ren Faire partier it seems.)
![15209230785_7c40ef685a_o[1].png](https://www.trekbbs.com/data/attachments/2/2267-b924b9fe78564ce436556195e0156e3f.jpg "15209230785_7c40ef685a_o[1].png")
I completely agree. The best Star Trek episodes are not obsessed with abstract science fiction concepts, they are ones where a science fiction framework allows for a story about characters, moral dilemmas, challenges and decisions. Take an episode like I, Borg - there's a science fiction element to it, the alien race who are linked through a collective consciousness, but it's not about that. It's about individuality, loneliness, the humanity of your enemy, leadership, and the ethics of war. That's what I hope for from Discovery, stories that are about something.
I would go with that. I like idea, or plot driven stories the best, with dialogue second and characters third. Don't get me wrong, characters are important, but I'd rather have them be in service of a good idea. People are the least important part of stories to me, and I normally don't really identify with characters in films or TV and I have no interest in cosplaying them or wanting to be any of them, never have.
Discovery will be the most modern dramatic Trek and I think it will be a critical success because of of that drama. It'll be the overall tv "novel" idea that sucks me in though.
RAMA
Discovery will be the most modern dramatic Trek and I think it will be a critical success because of of that drama. It'll be the overall tv "novel" idea that sucks me in though.
RAMA
Prove it, I will wait.
What, you think that's unlikely?
Lots of folks met these people when they were doing the show. I hung out with O'Hare at a Baltimore convention run by Joe Motes, when O'Hare was still shooting B5, and talked with Christian at a convention in Charlottesville in 1996 (not about this topic).
There's nothing at all remarkable about that. You'll find at least dozens of people on this board who've met or known genre actors and writers socially, at least in passing.
Lots of folks met these people when they were doing the show. I hung out with O'Hare at a Baltimore convention run by Joe Motes, when O'Hare was still shooting B5, and talked with Christian at a convention in Charlottesville in 1996 (not about this topic).
There's nothing at all remarkable about that. You'll find at least dozens of people on this board who've met or known genre actors and writers socially, at least in passing.
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Who said what is kind of irreverent. It's pretty clear from several events and story bits in season one that Sheridan's arc was meant for Sinclair. Not to mention there was the whole "rebirth" ceremony in Parliament of Dreams. Or that Carolyn Catherine was meant to be Anna.
There are lots of other little things that are pretty obvious if you're looking for them.
ETA: And this goes into what I was saying before. JMS may have started with a plan, but I doubt it was ever much more than a rough outline on a handful of index cards. No TV producer in his right might would every plan out a TV series down to the meticulous detail some have suggested he did. (Especially not one a such a flimsy network.)
I would easily bet at least 80% of what ended up on screen he made-up as the show went along.
There are lots of other little things that are pretty obvious if you're looking for them.
ETA: And this goes into what I was saying before. JMS may have started with a plan, but I doubt it was ever much more than a rough outline on a handful of index cards. No TV producer in his right might would every plan out a TV series down to the meticulous detail some have suggested he did. (Especially not one a such a flimsy network.)
I would easily bet at least 80% of what ended up on screen he made-up as the show went along.
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But it never really was. I think of plots when I think of TOs, and it was the most plot driven show of all of them. In fact, only 3 of the characters had any significant role to play, and most of those weren't really dramatic.
RAMA
Yet, it was a very plot driven show that happened to have great characters.
Ninja'd by RAMA!
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