i wish abrams had made a post ds9/voy movie isntead!
- Thread starter dHunter333
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I think any evidence you cite will be anecdotal, but it makes good sense to use names with which the general public is at least passingly familiar.
To me, anyway.
The Kirk/Spock/Enterprise combo is "Star Trek" to a lot of people who don't know much about Star Trek. So thats a hook. Making the movie seem exciting and must see is also a hook. I don't think "new characters" would have been a big enough hook to created enough buzz, even if the trailer looked exciting and must see.
Following that logic, no movie with original characters could ever be more successful than the Star Trek movie we got. All those original movies have are the trailers and other promotional stuff, no familiarity whatsoever. And yet new characters are certainly capable of generating box office hits.
They had Abrams, Orci, Kurtzman as the big names. And Eric Bana as the villain. And Eomer and Sylar. Granted, Urban and Quinto maybe wouldn't have been cast, maybe they would. But they could have gotten even bigger names.
They had Abrams, Orci, Kurtzman as the big names. And Eric Bana as the villain. And Eomer and Sylar. Granted, Urban and Quinto maybe wouldn't have been cast, maybe they would. But they could have gotten even bigger names.
Or it's fans of Star Trek in general with no particular affinity to any particular series and just found the movie to be a disappointment?
No, its just that Star Trek characters are part of the selling point of a Star Trek movies. There is a "comfort food" factor involved. Same with Lord of the Rings, Harry Potter, Batman, Spider-Man or a dozen other properties brought to the screen from other sources.
Would a movie with the same plot, but without the Star Trek character be as big a hit? Hard to say since the movies plot hinges on a certain level of familiarity with the characters.
People would've thought it was a Galaxy Quest sequel.
Prequel. Just how did Taggart meet up with Dr Lazarus?
This. I love TNG, but there is plenty of it. Yes, I wish they'd had a better final appearance, but it is what it is.
AFAIK, there really aren't very many TNG fans who don't like TOS. I think most of us are Trek fans across the board. Each series has its warts.
STXI was a lot of fun, but I didn't find it a compelling drama, nor did it even try much to be one. That's ok. There may be good reasons for that. I was surprised how heavily STXI seemed to draw on NEM in terms of the tone of its Romulans, the super-ship, the villain hell-bent on planetary destruction.
I don't care what crew it is in STXII. If there is a villain with a super-weapon trying to kill a planet, my head will explode.
Both DS9 and Voyager concluded their respective story lines and had no reason to have a film for either also commercially they wouldn't have done so well.
Yeah...I don't think so. I don't think there are many of those. "Fans of Star Trek in general" generally liked it.
There was a poll here early on of older TOS fans, and by a wide margin they liked the movie rather than otherwise. I think it's modern series fans who are unhappy about it the most.
A poll some years ago showed that DS-9 fans were the most likely to like no other Trek than DS-9. Thirty-nine percent liked no other Trek series. The ratio was lower among other groups.
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Human Excrement > Insurrection > Voyager > Nemesis > Enterprise
The theaters would have been empty except for a few people.
Hey, are you the same Space_Therapist from StarTrek.com's forums?
Disillusioned
Commander
Worked awesome for "Lost in Space" and "Planet of the Apes."
Nothing in the movie really establishes it as being from the "prime" universe though.
Your argument isn't really based on all that much, though. TNG was actually the series that was most popular with mainstream audiences, so names like Picard, Riker, and Data are probably just as likely to be known to people who don't know much about Star Trek, and plenty probably get them confused and mixed up. When you're talking like an action sci-fi popcorn flick like this one, I highly doubt name recognition played as much into as you seem to think. This movie had some of the best hype behind it of any of the movies and it also had big names associated with it like JJ Abrams. But I's still bet that the majority of the people who went to see it only went because the trailer convinced them it was an action sci-fi popcorn flick. the same sort of people who go to watch Star Wars for the space battles, basically.
Which means they'll try again.Worked awesome for "Lost in Space" and "Planet of the Apes."
In my experience people think of Kirk and Spock when you say Star Trek. YMMV
Occasionally things need to be rebooted.
And yeah, I think reboot is the proper term for Trek XI and don't have a problem with the concept.
To studios, the idea of starting fresh and going with iconic ideas is appealing. Start Batman over, do the iconic origin, then for the sequel to the Joker.
I think Kirk, Spock etc might have caused the studio to give this movie a marketing budget it wouldn't have had if it were "another TNG movie".
Don't get me wrong, I would have seen it either way, and think JJ Abrams would have made a good movie, but I always felt the TOS crew would be recast, and was happy I was there to see it.
And yeah, I think reboot is the proper term for Trek XI and don't have a problem with the concept.
To studios, the idea of starting fresh and going with iconic ideas is appealing. Start Batman over, do the iconic origin, then for the sequel to the Joker.
I think Kirk, Spock etc might have caused the studio to give this movie a marketing budget it wouldn't have had if it were "another TNG movie".
Don't get me wrong, I would have seen it either way, and think JJ Abrams would have made a good movie, but I always felt the TOS crew would be recast, and was happy I was there to see it.
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