Nimoy: Impossible for Trek to go back to TV

[Kegek]

North Pole-aris said:
Then the fact that it was ridiculous and over-the-top in the first season was accidental?

"We're sitting on the biggest bomb in history!"

No, more that it took itself seriously enough. As ludricous as the science was, Space: 1999 was certainly trying to depict itself as a serious work environment with space professionals in its first season, a season that saw a noted absence, of, for instance, changelings getting third billing.

 

[Admiral Buzzkill]

Kegek Kringle said:
No, more that it took itself seriously enough.

Then the writers simply had tin ears. The "biggest bomb in history" line is from the pilot episode, and the scripts are full of such misfires.

 

[Noname Given]

North Pole-aris said:
That's Nimoy's observation regarding the production quality of the upcoming film, as reported by producer Roberto Orci over at Trekmovie.com:

A few weeks before shooting, Nimoy came by the studio for a wardrobe fit and to discuss whatever last minute questions he had. While he was there, we took him on a little tour, showing him some of the set designs and conceptual art. After seeing the scale and production value of what we were doing he said it would be impossible to go back to television after this.

Link

Yeah, and back in 1987 he thought TNG would not be successful and that it wasn't possible to capture 'lightning in a bottle' again. In the entertainment world, anything is possible if the right people are backing it.

That said, it's another thing that (imo) bodes well for this film, but again, I wait until the final product is out and being promoted before applauding or passing on the film.

 

[Kegek]

North Pole-aris said:
Then the writers simply had tin ears. The "biggest bomb in history" line is from the pilot episode, and the scripts are full of such misfires.

I know that. It's the nonsensical plot that shoots the Moon out of orbit, after which it travels on a trajectory through the galaxy that doesn't make any sense no matter how one analyses it.

But the series was hardly playing that for campy humour, no?

 

[Redfern]

Obviously, Space:1999 paid a good deal of homage to 2001, particularly in terms of miniature design and the theme of a cosmos so alien we can't even begin to fathom (as with 2001's Monolith). Since so much was inspired by Clark and Kubrick's space epic, Gerry and Sylvia Anderson might as well have taken it one step further. Instead of a nuclear waste dump reaching critical mass and ungoing nuclear fusion, blasting the moon out of orbit, the pilot could have depicted the discovery of an alien artifact buried within lunar surface. Except, it's not a beacon like 2001's Monolith. The "thing" activates and teleports the whole of Luna to parts unknown. It's a d*mned "jump" drive and its operation is totally erratic!

Hey, as "high concept" as that is, I think it's a tad more believable than an explosion that can somehow knock the moon about like an intergalactic billiard ball! Otherwise, the premise could have worked pretty much as before. Between "jumps", the crew of Alpha could have encountered their various MUFs (Mysterious Unknown Forces) that usually left Koenig scratching his head and wondering, "WTF?!"

Sincerely,

Bill

 

[Nowhere Man]

North Pole-aris said:
I was far more interested in what this implies about the designs and production values of the new Trek movie, given that Nimoy has worked on and closely observed the production of six of them with budgets ranging from TV-level to ridiculously high.

dido I think this is a statement that promotes the movie more than anything, that being said, if this movie is successfull i think they will go for another series although i have no clue when and where it would be set

 

[Samuel T. Cogley]

HunterB5446 said:
if this movie is successfull i think they will go for another series although i have no clue when and where it would be set

It will be set in the Los Angeles underground and the Enterprise will be a black van with a red stripe on the side.

 

[number6]

^ I pity the fool who would miss that!!

 

[wamdue]

please to god let the trailer for this movie be better than the one for TMP (on the link)

 

[Devon]

zenophite said:

Yeah. Or possibly Orci paraphrasing him on what exactly he really did say. But I saw the point regardless.

?

Problem?

 

[Aragorn]

wamdue said:
please to god let the trailer for this movie be better than the one for TMP (on the link)

The trailer for the next movie will show the signature signoff from Star Trek VI... as an X is placed through all of their names and the new actors sign their own names.

 

[Balthier the Great]

Yukon Cornelius said:

wamdue said:
please to god let the trailer for this movie be better than the one for TMP (on the link)

The trailer for the next movie will show the signature signoff from Star Trek VI... as an X is placed through all of their names and the new actors sign their own names.

If you're going to do that, I wanna see new Kirk writing on the Starfleet Blackboard.

I will not call my teacher "Hot Cakes"

 

[23skidoo]

Just going back to Nimoy's original comment about it being impossible for it to go back to TV, I partly agree and partly disagree. I disagree because when it comes to SFX it's already possible to create effects for TV that are on par if not superior to what we saw in the theaters even 5 years ago: as evidence I present the new versions of BSG and Doctor Who; Doctor Who, in particular, had a completely CGI character rendered at the same quality level as Gollum was 6 years ago. And things like morphing that back in 1991 were restricted to mega-million-dollar movies like Terminator 2 are today rendered quite easily in shows like Heroes. So it doesn't matter what Trek XI throws at us in terms of SFX and CG, it'll be equalled by television production within a very few years.

My view is Trek can't go back to TV because of the contempt of the fanbase towards televised Trek remains so high, and it would be too difficult for a new Trek series to maintain for 22 episodes the level of quality that (we hope) Trek XI delivers. A Trek mini-series or a UK-formatted season a la Doctor Who might improve the quality level somewhat, but it would still be too difficult to maintain, especially for a franchise that is studio/conglomorate-owned.

Cheers!

Alex

 

[Vektor]

I’d say the main impediment to Trek’s return to television is not the fans and their expectations but rather the lack of interest in sci-fi by general TV audiences. The average person out there seems to love sci-fi spectaculars on the big screen but could really care less about watching them on a weekly basis on the small screen. I’m talking about futuristic, space-based sci-fi like Star Trek and Star Wars, not the contemporary pseudo-sci-fi of Lost or Heroes. Sure, shows like BSG and Stargate have their small but dedicated followings and generally do okay on the Sci-Fi Channel and other cable channels, but space opera just doesn’t seem to appeal to huge television audiences anymore.

Having said that, there are a couple of possible game-changers on the horizon. One is the new Trek movie itself, which might, conceivably, be so hugely popular and successful as to make a new Trek series viable. Another is the live-action Star Wars series, which last I heard was set to debut in 2009. If there is ever going to be a sea-change in public attitude toward space opera sci-fi on television, those two events are probably most likely to initiate it.

 

[DarthTom]

Vektor said:
The average person out there seems to love sci-fi spectaculars on the big screen but could really care less about watching them on a weekly basis on the small screen. I’m talking about futuristic, space-based sci-fi like Star Trek and Star Wars, not the contemporary pseudo-sci-fi of Lost or Heroes. Sure, shows like BSG and Stargate have their small but dedicated followings and generally do okay on the Sci-Fi Channel and other cable channels, but space opera just doesn’t seem to appeal to huge television audiences anymore.

I think you under estimate the universal popularity of Wars versus the cult following of Trek.

BTW, the hottest toy this year for Christmas is from the film Transformers and while not Trek like sci-fi, still sci-fi. Do you think if Transformers was on the air again it wouldn't be popular?

 

[Classic Fan]

Kegek Kringle said:

North Pole-aris said:
I was far more interested in what this implies about the designs and production values of the new Trek movie, given that Nimoy has worked on and closely observed the production of six of them with budgets ranging from TV-level to ridiculously high.

Quite. In a backhanded way, this is the most ringing endorsement of the film's visuals I've heard so far. Clearly, the unprecedented budget is being used wisely.

But as to the issue at hand, I'm fine if Star Trek is now just a movie series. It milked the TV idea for way too long anyway.

I agree also.

If this film needs at least one endorsement, its this one.

When i read this my spirits really lifted about the movie.

Also, the budget suggests this is gonna a big production.
$35 Mil for TMP was a landmark budget in '79, and it delivered with stunning visuals and model/miniature effects that are still almost flawless to this day, ive even compared CG shots to the '79 model shots and they pretty good considering this was before the advent of green screen, advanced CGI processes etc.



With that ammount of money, and Nimoy's kind of endorsement, im hoping its gonna be a good one.

 

[Admiral Buzzkill]

DarthTom said:
I think you under estimate the universal popularity of Wars versus the cult following of Trek.

You overestimate the popularity of SW, if not the cult following of Trek.

 

[Captaindemotion]

North Pole-aris said:

Ovation said:
That has certainly been surpassed, in absolute as well as relative, dollars but, at the time, it represented quite an expensive budget.

Exactly so. Again, at the time it represented the biggest expenditure on any film made in the West, ever.

Aside from which, boxofficemojo's budget number is about ten million dollars less than studio sources claimed in 1979 and other authorities have maintained since. For a number of years the film was listed in the Guinness Book of World Records.

To be fair to TMP, the idea of it being the most expensive movie ever at the time is somewhat misleading. That budget was not all spent on TMP - it wasn't a money gobbler the way that Waterworld or Titanic was. Rather, for complicated accounting reasons, all the money which had been expended on previous abortive Trek movies (Planet of the Titans etc) and on Phase II were laid to the movie. Only a portion of it was actually spent on TMP itself. Similarly, the ridiculous $250m budget for Superman Returns incorporates monies spent on abortive Superman projects over the previous decade, not simply on Bryan Singer's movie.

However it is fair to say that allowing for inflation it was, until the new movie, the most expensive Trek movie of all. The remit given to Harve Bennett et al in making the second movie was to make it cheaper than its predecessor!

 

[Admiral Buzzkill]

Captaindemotion said:
To be fair to TMP, the idea of it being the most expensive movie ever at the time is somewhat misleading. That budget was not all spent on TMP - it wasn't a money gobbler the way that Waterworld or Titanic was. Rather, for complicated accounting reasons, all the money which had been expended on previous abortive Trek movies (Planet of the Titans etc) and on Phase II were laid to the movie. Only a portion of it was actually spent on TMP itself. Similarly, the ridiculous $250m budget for Superman Returns incorporates monies spent on abortive Superman projects over the previous decade, not simply on Bryan Singer's movie.

Exactly - the "creative accounting" employed on TMP wasn't and isn't unusual, so we can't go into special pleading on its behalf.

 

[Kegek]

North Pole-aris said:
Exactly - the "creative accounting" employed on TMP wasn't and isn't unusual, so we can't go into special pleading on its behalf.

Another classic example is the 1964 Cleopatra. Its costs include sets built in England that were all scrapped when the outdoor weather was deemed unsuitable, and Stephen Boyd's contemporaneous stint as Antony.