^ This.
No disrespect intended Harvey; your exhaustive research and resultant contributions to the board have been invaluable. I personally believe TNG-R probably underperformed on BD, mainly due to a glut of TV on disc, a relatively high initial price, and the decline of retail shelf space for physical media. Are there any solid sales numbers we can look to? And how is success or failure measured?
Granted, technically the title of these threads mentions BD and not HD (which includes physical media, broadcast, and streaming). I for one would like to see some solid sales figures before passing judgment on the success or failure of TNG-R on BD.
For everyone here who thinks they know how the entertainment business works, that CBS took a bath on TNG-R and that's why DS9-R (and VOY-R for that matter) are never going to happen, you may want to think again.
The entertainment business is *highly* risk-averse. Sure they screw up on the occasional John Carter or Jupiter Ascending (they more than make up for that with safe superhero movies and rom-coms, not to mention international box-office), but in the case of TNG-R I'm pretty sure CBS was in the black (via syndication and streaming deals) before the first BD hit the shelves. Same for TOS-R; it was heavily subsidized by Toshiba to help launch their doomed HD-DVD format.
Now these streaming (and to a lesser extent TV syndication) deals are often crazy, driven by providers with lots of investor cash and lots of bandwidth to fill (e.g. Amazon). That $700,000 per (24-minute!) episode Hulu deal for Seinfeld is preposterous. At 180 episodes that's $126 million! There's no way Hulu's gonna see that kind of return from an aging '90s sitcom (however well-regarded), but it's pure profit for the licensor Sony, and their remastering costs were almost nil.
How does this relate to DS9-R? It was nowhere near as popular as Seinfeld and would fetch nowhere near $700K per episode. It's remastering costs would be in a whole different league (and no, none of the existing CGI assets can be reused, for technical reasons that have been explained well elsewhere), and speculating on those costs is pointless except to say they should decrease over time as technology and work flows improve. All DS9-R really needs is a deal, a buyer or buyers (linear TV network, streaming provider, etc.) for the show in HD to whom CBS can pre-sell the rights.
IIRC, Maxwell Everett had some insight on the existing broadcast syndication and streaming deals for TNG-R in one of the other threads. Again, nowhere near $700K per episode, but enough to pay for the remastering project? Very likely, and after that it's all gravy for CBS as they sell it to other providers.
It could happen something like this: CBS decides to shop around DS9-R and VOY-R as a package to providers. The pitch might make the case that, say, DS9-R fits into the BET (coincidentally operated by Viacom) lineup because of Avery Brooks as Captain Sisko. Let's face it, TNG is in heavy rotation on BBCA because of Brits Stewart and (to a lesser extent) Sirtis (I call it the "British Accent Channel"), so that's not a stretch. Viacom could air DS9 on BET and VOY on, say, A&E.
Totally hypothetical, but not crazy either. This is why all that "buy TNG-R on BD if you want DS9-R" was utter self-promoting BS; the fans are not a factor. Physical media sales are on CBS' radar screen but largely irrelevant; of course they're looking to the future of online distribution. CBS has to want to sell it, a good sales department has to sell it (and it could very well be bundled in with a bunch of other CBS properties) and justify the additional cost for HD over SD, and all that has to make sense for the buyer.
CBS and Paramount arguably haven't taken a risk on Star Trek since TMP in 1979. They knew that Trek had limited international appeal (at least until Trek '09) so the movies were all done relatively cheaply with safe, non-challenging plotlines. Even TNG in 1987 had a safety net; if it flopped it could be folded into the TOS syndication package. Very little was left to chance. That's how you effectively manage a cash cow.
The reason I think DS9-R (*not* BD) stands a good chance of happening in the next, oh, 5 years is that it has aged pretty well; it has that dark, moody aesthetic that plays well (and can sell) even today (unlike the very '80s look of TNG -- which I love BTW). The diverse cast is a plus, but Trek's usually had that already. Costly to remaster? Sure, but there's no reason to assume that it *must* be unprofitable (and where are some of these remastering cost figures in this thread coming from anyway? $40-50 million?). The real question is not *when* it will be done but *how* it will be done (upscaled, recomposited, some combination, etc.). Certainly CBS is looking at the reception for the quasi-remastered X-Files in HD to guide their plans. Unfortunately, without BD we'll almost certainly have to kiss OAR goodbye in favor of 16x9 cropping.
Ultimately, Star Trek is still probably CBS and Paramount's biggest crown jewel, although one might doubt it by how the franchise is being managed for the 50th anniversary (particularly compared to how Disney is handling Star Wars, perfectly -- so far). Maybe they're deliberately laying low with Trek while Star Wars sucks all of the air out of the room (but it's gonna be while before that ends).
So let's stipulate: Yeah, Hollywood's a business, they don't owe the fans anything (kind of a straw-man argument, not sure I've seen that sentiment widely expressed), they're not going to do it for historical purposes (although the studios do care about content preservation and have departments in charge of that, DS9-R is not going to happen for that reason), DS9 was not as popular as TNG, and the remastering costs will be significant. But let's also consider that CBS is a business with a property (DS9) that they have a considerable production investment in that they're in the business of continually monetizing -- yes, profitably -- and there are probably buyers out there with their checkbooks open (again, not talking about BD here). That's what it will really take to get DS9-R.
And after I am done with that, I will shake my fist against CBS and yell "Khaaaaan!" at them again.
