It wouldn't kill Paramount to make a 5th TNG movie, or will it?

[Maurice]

Movie                    Tickets Bought   Rank by tickets
The Motion Picture       33,303,019        1
The Wrath of Khan        26,841,144        3
Search for Spock         22,759,240        4
The Voyage Home          29,572,273        2
The Final Frontier       13,085,225        9
TUC                      17,788,360        7
Generations              18,546,844        6
First Contact            20,820,789        5
Insurrection             14,965,386        8
Nemesis                   7,457,657       10

http://www.natoonline.org/statisticstickets.htm

Sorted by Rank by tickets:

Movie                    Tickets Bought   Rank by tickets
The Motion Picture       33,303,019        1
The Voyage Home          29,572,273        2
The Wrath of Khan        26,841,144        3
Search for Spock         22,759,240        4
First Contact            20,820,789        5
Generations              18,546,844        6
TUC                      17,788,360        7
Insurrection             14,965,386        8
The Final Frontier       13,085,225        9
Nemesis                   7,457,657       10

I dunno if everyone could see the Ticket Sold column or scrolled to see it, so I modified the table and added the ranking by tickets sold as a point of discussion.

 

[BillJ]

I dunno if everyone could see the Ticket Sold column or scrolled to see it, so I modified the table and added the ranking by tickets sold as a point of discussion.

 

[Captain Mike]

I dunno if everyone could see the Ticket Sold column or scrolled to see it, so I modified the table and added the ranking by tickets sold as a point of discussion.

I can't support this idea of "how many tickets sold". Are you counting the multiple ones bought individually on different viewings?
Hell except for 2009 and Nemesis, I bought no more than 10 and no less than three to each and every one of these films. And I know I wasn't the only one....

 

[BillJ]

I dunno if everyone could see the Ticket Sold column or scrolled to see it, so I modified the table and added the ranking by tickets sold as a point of discussion.

I can't support this idea of "how many tickets sold". Are you counting the multiple ones bought individually on different viewings?
Hell except for 2009 and Nemesis, I bought no more than 10 and no less than three to each and every one of these films. And I know I wasn't the only one....

The number of tickets sold is based on the average ticket price the year each film was released. Whether a person buys one or ten doesn't really matter to the studio... they still get the money.

 

[Admiral Buzzkill]

I can't support this idea of "how many tickets sold".

Of course not, because it's just one more data point putting another nail in the coffin of the mistaken idea that TNG was as successful on the big screen as the TOS-based films.

There's just no honest way to treat the data and come to that conclusion.

 

[Captain Mike]

I dunno if everyone could see the Ticket Sold column or scrolled to see it, so I modified the table and added the ranking by tickets sold as a point of discussion.

I can't support this idea of "how many tickets sold". Are you counting the multiple ones bought individually on different viewings?
Hell except for 2009 and Nemesis, I bought no more than 10 and no less than three to each and every one of these films. And I know I wasn't the only one....

The number of tickets sold is based on the average ticket price the year each film was released. Whether a person buys one or ten doesn't really matter to the studio... they still get the money.

Which is very inaccurate way to base it on tickets sold due to the increase of their prices over the years....
If you tabulated each and every movie to the average or even the same price(s) then I would support your hypothesis.

I can't support this idea of "how many tickets sold".

Of course not, because it's just one more data point putting another nail in the coffin of the mistaken idea that TNG was as successful on the big screen as the TOS-based films.

There's just no honest way to treat the data and come to that conclusion.

I disagree.

 

[Greg Cox]

Why bother crunching the numbers? This is all academic. TNG had a good long run, but it's over now . . . until somebody reboots it umpteen years from now.

And, of course, there are always the books.

 

[BillJ]

Which is very inaccurate way to base it on tickets sold due to the increase of their prices over the years....
If you tabulated each and every movie to the average or even the same price(s) then I would support your hypothesis.

Once again...

If ticket prices remained steady since the release of TMP (say a buck a piece) all you have to do is look at tickets sold to see which films made the most money.

Did the TNG films have TV competition? Yes. Were they also showing on more screens than the earlier films? Yes. Did the later films cost more to make? Yes.

Every film has challenges when it opens. Is it fair that The Final Frontier had to face off against an Indiana Jones sequel and the first Batman film? Is it fair that Nemesis had to do battle with The Lord of the Rings?

People seem desperate to make excuses as to why the TNG films underperformed. When the simple fact is that TNG just doesn't translate very well on the big screen.

 

[Admiral Buzzkill]

No, the simple fact is that they were less successful than TOS-based films. Explanations for that, or excuses intended to mitigate it, are just opinions.

 

[Captain Mike]

Once again...

If ticket prices remained steady since the release of TMP (say a buck a piece) all you have to do is look at tickets sold to see which films made the most money.

Did the TNG films have TV competition? Yes. Were they also showing on more screens than the earlier films? Yes. Did the later films cost more to make? Yes.

Every film has challenges when it opens. Is it fair that The Final Frontier had to face off against an Indiana Jones sequel and the first Batman film? Is it fair that Nemesis had to do battle with The Lord of the Rings?

People seem desperate to make excuses as to why the TNG films underperformed. When the simple fact is that TNG just doesn't translate very well on the big screen.

But they (at least two of them) didn't under-perform. Do I understand why Paramount wanted to discontinue making TNG films? Yes. Do I think that TNG was more successful than TOS films? No.

The TOS film series began ten years after TOS had ended, allowing a lot of demand to be built up. The TNG film series started right after the show ended.


more importantly, the first four TOS films came out during a time when there was no Trek series on TV. TNG films came out when there was always at least one star trek series on the air, and two series on the air at the same time when FC and INS came out.

Generations was being produced and filmed at the same time as AGT and released not soon after it premiered.

 

[Maurice]

In short, the trend was for declining ticket sales and a slow uptick in budgets. Four of the top of five Trek films in tickets sales are TOS movies, and while TFF is arguably a flop, TUC, even at 7th in tickets sold, was very profitable having made something close to three times its production cost. On the other hand it looks like Generations made just slightly over twice its budget, and Insurrection barely made over its budget. Just to break even you have to make in box-office twice or more what the picture cost, so two out of four TNG movies failed to turn a profit at all, whereas four out of six TOS films made healthy profits, one failed to turn a profit (TFF), and one basically made back its budget (TMP, but the film's 45 million budget has long been suspect as Hollywood "creative bookkeeping", so it's likely more profitable that it appears on the surface).

 

[JarodRussell]

What's the annual revenue and gain of Paramount, the company?

 

[CaptainStoner]

Here is another set of numbers http://www.boxofficemojo.com/franchises/chart/?id=startrek.htm
which I have also adjusted to 2010 dollars.
(total gross)
1 Star Trek $257,730,019 / ?
2 Star Trek IV: The Voyage Home $109,713,132 / 215,220,354
3 Star Trek: First Contact $92,027,888 / 126,555,547
4 Star Trek: The Motion Picture $82,258,456 / 243,780,587
5 Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan $78,912,963 / 175,902,100
6 Star Trek III: The Search for Spock $76,471,046 / 158,363,721
7 Star Trek: Generations . $75,671,125 / 109,863,394
8 Star Trek VI: The Undiscovered Country $74,888,996 / 118,348,468
9 Star Trek: Insurrection $70,187,658 / 93,413,108
10 Star Trek V: The Final Frontier $52,210,049 / 90,616,453
11 Star Trek: Nemesis $43,254,409 / 52,106608


So, when we adjust for inflation the most financially succesful Star Trek Films are:

1. Star Trek
2. Star Trek: TMP
3. ST IV
4. ST II
5. ST III
6. ST: FC
7. ST VI
8. ST: GEN
9. ST: INS
10. ST V
11. ST: NEM
​

 

[Temis the Vorta]

Tossing around numbers is beside the point. Paramount has a successful Star Trek franchise now. They're not going to upend existing success to gamble on something unknown.

 

[sonak]

No, the simple fact is that they were less successful than TOS-based films. Explanations for that, or excuses intended to mitigate it, are just opinions.

statistics without context are often meaningless and can be used to support any argument one wants to make. A sports team with a great record against inferior competition in a weaker conference is NOT better than a team with a slightly worse win-loss record against much better competition.


It's undeniable that the first four TOS movies were more financially successful than the four TNG films. However, this is a comparison that lacks context.


if the split were TOS vs TNG films, then we'd expect that TFF and TUC would have similarly been more successful than the TNG films. This is not the case. Why? Because the trend is NOT TNG vs TOS.


Let me restate the trend, even though I know the response from the "TOS films were much more successful" crowd will be akin to "lalalalalalalala I can't hear you!"


the trend is that Trek films tend to do worse the more competition from other Trek material there is. From TFF to NEM, all the films faced "competition" from TV trek, and none of them, except for FC, was as successful as any of the first four TOS films.


Star Trek XI also came out when there was no competition from television Trek and was also a huge hit.

 

[sonak]

Once again...

If ticket prices remained steady since the release of TMP (say a buck a piece) all you have to do is look at tickets sold to see which films made the most money.

Did the TNG films have TV competition? Yes. Were they also showing on more screens than the earlier films? Yes. Did the later films cost more to make? Yes.

Every film has challenges when it opens. Is it fair that The Final Frontier had to face off against an Indiana Jones sequel and the first Batman film? Is it fair that Nemesis had to do battle with The Lord of the Rings?

People seem desperate to make excuses as to why the TNG films underperformed. When the simple fact is that TNG just doesn't translate very well on the big screen.

But they (at least two of them) didn't under-perform. Do I understand why Paramount wanted to discontinue making TNG films? Yes. Do I think that TNG was more successful than TOS films? No.

The TOS film series began ten years after TOS had ended, allowing a lot of demand to be built up. The TNG film series started right after the show ended.


more importantly, the first four TOS films came out during a time when there was no Trek series on TV. TNG films came out when there was always at least one star trek series on the air, and two series on the air at the same time when FC and INS came out.

Generations was being produced and filmed at the same time as AGT and released not soon after it premiered.

um, I don't know why you restated what I wrote here. I wrote that the TNG film series started right after the show ended, and you said it was "released soon after AGT premiered."

AGT was May '94. GEN was Nov '94. This is what is known as "releasing a film right after a show ends."

 

[BillJ]

Let me restate the trend, even though I know the response from the "TOS films were much more successful" crowd will be akin to "lalalalalalalala I can't hear you!"

But you're only including criteria that helps your point, instead of looking at the entire landscape.

Star Trek: The Motion Picture was only on 1,002 screens, Star Trek: Generations was on 2,681 screens. Plus it was coming right behind a highly successful TV series and had a serious marketing push behind it. Yet sold 15 million fewer tickets.

It was far easier for people to access the TNG movies than their TOS counterparts.

You sound like Shatner when he tried to blame the failure of The Final Frontier on TNG. I think the fact that First Contact sold twenty million tickets with two first run and two strip syndication Star Trek series on the air pops a hole in this particular theory. I also don't think it's a coincidence that the most popular TNG film was the one that was most unlike TNG the TV series.

The Undiscovered Country continued to pay for the failure of The Final Frontier (hence the low budget)... general audiences simply were leery of Trek. I don't care how good a fifth TNG film would've been, it would have suffered because of the spectacular failure that was Nemesis.

 

[Rarewolf]

I'm sure Steward, McFadden, Burton, and Dorn were jealous of Franks, Spiner, and Sirtis.

With all due respect though they aren't going to be jealous of the fact Marina was always available and leapt at the slightest chance to reprise the role.

Personally I'd like to see her cast as the new voice of the Enterprise computer, pass it from mother to daughter as it were.

The funny thing is, TNG will be 25 next year. Yet because their films were straight after their series rather than a 10 year gap, they don't seemed to have aged as much.

 

[sonak]

Let me restate the trend, even though I know the response from the "TOS films were much more successful" crowd will be akin to "lalalalalalalala I can't hear you!"

But you're only including criteria that helps your point, instead of looking at the entire landscape.

Star Trek: The Motion Picture was only on 1,002 screens, Star Trek: Generations was on 2,681 screens. Plus it was coming right behind a highly successful TV series and had a serious marketing push behind it. Yet sold 15 million fewer tickets.

It was far easier for people to access the TNG movies than their TOS counterparts.

You sound like Shatner when he tried to blame the failure of The Final Frontier on TNG. I think the fact that First Contact sold twenty million tickets with two first run and two strip syndication Star Trek series on the air pops a hole in this particular theory. I also don't think it's a coincidence that the most popular TNG film was the one that was most unlike TNG the TV series.

The Undiscovered Country continued to pay for the failure of The Final Frontier (hence the low budget)... general audiences simply were leery of Trek. I don't care how good a fifth TNG film would've been, it would have suffered because of the spectacular failure that was Nemesis.

those are fair points about Generations. I agree that it defintely underperformed considering it was a unique Star Trek film that combined a partial TOS cast with the TNG crew and received heavy marketing. And as you say, TNG, which was hugely popular, had just ended and was just going into movies.



Quality of film certainly plays a role. TWOK-TVH were all good films and that helped keep the movie franchise popular. TFF was a weaker film and had ridiculous competition in a unique blockbuster year for films.


All I'm saying is that going by the argument that "TOS films were much more successful than TNG" films, you'd have expected TFF and especially TUC, which was critically well received, to be big hits.

Since they weren't, it means that it's not strictly a "TOS vs TNG" phenomenon.

 

[Mark 2000]

I think the TNG film series was a failure, and it's to be expected. There was a huge amount of inbreeding going on, and unlike with the TOS films, which tried to put the series in the hands of new blood, Braga, Berman, and Moore were continually put in charge.

Gen was terrible. The TOS portions were obviously written by people with no respect for the characters, and every single plot point is ludicrous.

FC is supposed to be a huge success, but no matter what you think of it (I hate it) having to retool the series to make it action oriented and turning the concept of the Borg on its head in order to get people's attention is not making a successful *TNG* movie.

INS was just dull. It comes closest to an episode of the show, but a bad one. Despite the fact that FC did well, INS seems to have been screwed on budget.

NEM, I don't think there's any question here that this is the worst of all Trek films. TFF is more watchable.

So, yes, the TNG film series was a failure. AGT would have been the best goodbye for the series.