Rick Berman: Yea or Nay?

[The Wormhole]

Berman wanted a maquis/federation conflict to be a regular theme on Voyager!?
Assuming that's true, I think there have been a lot of fans who are blaming Berman for things he never did. People have often complain that after the first episode of Voyager, there were only a couple of reminders that this ship had two separate crews who were former enemies. I've often said one season of Chakotay as captain after a mutiny, would have been awesome, and would have kept the audience in suspense of whether there would be another mutiny or not.

The great thing about the premise of Voyager is that they faced a different type of threat than the dominion or the borg presented, they faced the fear of the internal enemy; the two crews threatening to take and retake the ship.
Or at least that could have been what Voyager offered had they gone any where with it.

And now I hear Berman was in favor of the conflict? Wow.

And that just goes to backup my point that Producers do not have 100% control over the product they produce.
It's my understanding that the Network has more control than the producer.

A lot of the problems Voyager had, which Berman and Braga are frequently blamed for, were in fact UPN's fault. The best example is Year of Hell, which Braga originally pitched as a season long arc which would have lasting consequences for the series. Berman gave the idea his approval, but then UPN stepped in and said the story could be no longer than a two-parter, and had to be reset at the end.

I've never understood the series attitude of "it musn't contain long running arcs, networks might want to repeat the show out of order, etc etc"

Maybe it's just a British thing but we've had many different channels get their hands on Trek rights, from the 90s up until now, some with different levels of professionalism and commitment to others, and yet ALL of them have still started at season 1 and worked through them all in order.
They might pause a week or two for a sporting commitment or something else of that nature, but they always picked up next week right where they left off.

The only time I can ever remember the order being different is when Voyager was ending, Sky did a fan poll top ten episode rundown in the week before the finale, which meant they used up the rights to those episodes so in the next repeat run they missed out those eps, but once they reset themselves again it was back to normal.

Is this just a UK thing?

Re-runs in North America are almost in order, and at times when best of marathons are done it's not uncommon for those episodes to be omitted from the re-run line-up like you mentioned.

Although there are also examples of channels sometimes doing marathons, like what TNN/Spike did with TNG ten years ago. Basically, they did seven hour marathons every weekend which showed random episodes that had no real connection to each other. Even then, there was still some order, eg they'd start with a season 1 episode and end with a season 7.

 

[Frontier]

This poll needs a third option.

"Berman the Bean Counter wasn't Terrible, but He Made Lots of Bad Choices. Purgatory for him!" lol.

 

[BillJ]

This poll needs a third option.

"Berman the Bean Counter wasn't Terrible, but He Made Lots of Bad Choices. Purgatory for him!" lol.

I'm pretty sure nearly everyone would've picked that option, which was why I didn't provide it. I thought it interesting to see how people would rate the entirety of his run on the franchise.

 

[M.A.C.O.]

I was reading an interview with Rick Berman on startrek.com. Apparently Berman reads Star Trek forums and websites to see what people say about him. How weird is that? To think he may start or comment on topics that feature him and his work.

 

[BillJ]

I was reading an interview with Rick Berman on startrek.com. Apparently Berman reads Star Trek forums and websites to see what people say about him. How weird is that? To think he may start or comment on topics that feature him and his work.

I'd welcome the opportunity to ask him a few questions and hear him describe why he made certain choices over the years.

 

[Utopianvista]

After seeing Abrams ruin Trek I actually miss Berman.

Abrams has proven that the phrase be careful what you wish for is actually true. Blah.

 

[Dick_Valentine]

Abrams risk taking Trek is infinitely superior to Berman bean counting, play it safe Trek...

Lets face it, about the only trek produced by him I'm actually a fan of is series 3-6 TNG.
Ds9 he left to run itself and VOY and ENT were huge anti-climaxes/missed opportunities

The word I'd use to sum up his reign would be "cynical"

And the example I'd use to prove that point would be the look of the eponymous Enterprise
"Hey, the fans really liked that Akira class huh? Well lets slap some older panels on that ship and use it for our new series! That'll do!"

 

[F. King Daniel]

I was reading an interview with Rick Berman on startrek.com. Apparently Berman reads Star Trek forums and websites to see what people say about him. How weird is that? To think he may start or comment on topics that feature him and his work.

Great, now I'm gonna be picturing a bitter, half-drunk Rick Berman being behind all those JJ-bashing troll threads.

 

[The Wormhole]

I was reading an interview with Rick Berman on startrek.com. Apparently Berman reads Star Trek forums and websites to see what people say about him. How weird is that? To think he may start or comment on topics that feature him and his work.

TV producers do this quite a bit. Doctor Who's Russell T Davies even discusses reading what DW fandom writes about him online in his book The Writer's Tale.

 

[CaptJimboJones]

It's interesting to see how much credit people are now willing to give Berman for his positive influence on Trek compared with a few years ago, when his name around her was synonymous with "Hitler."

Despite some misses, I'm hugely grateful to Berman for basically saving TNG, co-creating DS9, and producing seasons 3&4 of Enterprise, which are among my favorite seasons of post-TOS Trek period.

I'm curious, what is he doing these days? Most of the other Trek alums (Branon Braga, Manny Coto, Ron Moore, etc) have had successful careers producing other shows.

Berman's Wikipedia entry just lists that since Enterprise ended, "Berman has indicated he is still involved in television production as well as projects "not connected to the television business" with no detail.

 

[Admiral Buzzkill]

Something like six hundred-plus episodes and four movies? Yeah, more than successful.

 

[Salinga]

I am listening to that Berman interview YT right now and I am surprised to hear, that Berman gets the number of the 1701-D wrong. In the interview he declares, the pilot of TNG is introducing the new ship "1701-E"...

[edit] lol - no wonder Sirtis was afraid to let go after Season 1... Berman even forgot her character name Deanna Troi during the interview.

[edit2] I also learned, that Nana Visitor played Ensign Ro on TNG and that it was in fact Captain Archer, who joined the aliens in the wormhole.

 

[stj]

I voted "yea" but really, his first series, DS9, was pretty crappy. Yes I know it's popular here. The only way to claim DS9 was even good is to make bizarre assumptions about serialization, the need to be trendy, etc.

 

[JarodRussell]

The only way to claim DS9 was even good is to make bizarre assumptions about serialization, the need to be trendy, etc.

Yeah, the only way.

 

[Lord Garth]

Someone once said "Without Rick Berman to keep the franchise running, there'd be no Rick Berman to ruin it." Irgo, Rick Berman kept the franchise running. And for how much and how long? 25 seasons over 18 years. I'd say that's pretty good. He was there the entire time so he takes the praise and the blame for the good years and the bad, rightly or wrongly.

I'd have liked to have seen someone else run the TNG films and I'd have liked to have seen Ron Moore running ENT, but that's about it.

 

[JarodRussell]

Okay, fine, so you either die a hero or you live long enough to see yourself become the villain.

 

[Lord Garth]

^ I like that. That sums it up perfectly.

If Rick Berman got out somewhere between 1994 and 2001 and Star Trek still lasted (in pre-reboot form) until 2005, then whoever was in charge at the end would've recieved the blame while Rick Berman would've looked rosey. People would've said, "Things were so much better when Rick Berman was around but [insert replacement's name] ruined it!"

Given what we know about what UPN wanted, ENT could've only been so different and it probably would've only run 4-5 seaosns before CW anyway. The show might've been different, the premise might've been different, but everything still would've turned out the same.

 

[Rarewolf]

I'd have to say Yes and No. A successful run, but he should have got out before he ruined it by doing a prequel.

 

[CoveTom]

I voted "yea" but really, his first series, DS9, was pretty crappy. Yes I know it's popular here. The only way to claim DS9 was even good is to make bizarre assumptions about serialization, the need to be trendy, etc.

Er... what?

 

[Rush Limborg]

Okay, fine, so you either die a hero or you live long enough to see yourself become the villain.

^ I like that. That sums it up perfectly.

If Rick Berman got out somewhere between 1994 and 2001 and Star Trek still lasted (in pre-reboot form) until 2005, then whoever was in charge at the end would've recieved the blame while Rick Berman would've looked rosey. People would've said, "Things were so much better when Rick Berman was around but [insert replacement's name] ruined it!"

Bingo. You both hit the nail on the head.

Given what we know about what UPN wanted, ENT could've only been so different and it probably would've only run 4-5 seaosns before CW anyway. The show might've been different, the premise might've been different, but everything still would've turned out the same.

Yep. To be honest, B & B tried their best to make the show compelling, amid the imposed standards of "what sells" (the sex stuff, etc.).

With UPN looking over their shoulder (shades of NBC and TOS, to be blunt), they did the best they could. They needed to give people a reason to watch ENT, aside from "YAWN--another Trek series?" (Not how we felt, of course--but I think the general public was suffering from an overload of Trek, by then.) Hence--a prequel, detailing "how it all began".

However...B & B also knew they had to give the show a suspense factor--otherwise, "Well, gee, we all know how it's all gonna turn out...." All that stuff about "The suspense is in how it happened" can only go so far, let's be frank.

Hence--the Temporal Cold War. Someone's trying to screw up the timeline--Daniels is trying to set things right, and Archer must put everything on the line to make things turn out as they should. And so, "But, Picard said first contact with the Klingons led to--", among other things, can be adjusted in compelling ways, without acting like established canon met nothing.

They gave as good as they got, amidst a public getting tired of Trek. I, personally, can't blame them for that.




That being said, TATV wasn't necessary....