Rolling Stone Magazine calls for the return of TNG to TV

[Lance]

^ While I do see the point you're making, I do also think that TAS has led to a lot in Trek fandom getting concerned about any animated foray into the franchise. In other words, there is definitely a contingent within the fandom whose sole experience with Star Trek in animated form "burnt their fingers", so to speak, and so they are therefore understandably reluctant to see the franchise ever try that particular medium again.

There are many people who won't be able to see that Trek could work very well in animation, until such time as somebody actually does and proves the point.

With all due respect, nobody is really going to care about an animated series except die hards who visit sites like this...I think that TNG's return (with some younger cast members) from a commercial point of view is a no brainier.

Star Trek: The Animated Series was made 40 years ago, by a company (Filmation) well known for recycling animation footage as much as possible.

If Trek fans are stupid enough to let something made that long ago blind them to the potential of a new animated series...I don't know what to say!

And, done right, I don't think a new Trek cartoon show would be limited to just existing Trek fans. In fact, I suspect a lot of existing Trek fans might snobbily dismiss it in any case.

No, I think a new animated show could find a younger generation of fans. Of course, it would be a bit more action-orientated (and I know some fans wail and gnash teeth when they see that phrase) but that doesn't mean it still can't have all the other elements we know and love about Trek.

Let's look at it this way: Trek fans often seem to hold up TAS as a reason why animated Trek "won't work". But... well, The Clones Wars has been moderately successful, and the fact that Star Wars had it's fair share of cheesy cartoons in the 1980s didn't do anything to harm that success.

 

[Flake]

Nope.

We are now at the TOS equivalent of 1992. It would be like asking the TOS cast to return to a weekly TV show a year after TUC!

Animated series, Season 8 on the Enterprise D. Now THAT I would watch!!

 

[Triskelion]

I can see it now....

Star Trek: CGI Teen Vampire Unit

 

[Rarewolf]

There was rumours of a TOS mini-series for the 30th Anniversary, but well, those were rumours. An Excelisor based TVM could have worked, as Flashback showed.

I think a Titan or Captain Worf show would work better than TNG ani8. It would be going forward, more than a stopgap slotted in before Generations.

One of the fun things with Clone Wars was seeing the many alien races faithfully recreated in CGI and given personalities.

A post TNG Animated series could have cameos from the Enterprise E crew, DS9, Voyager, even TOS in the Holodeck.

By that reason why does anyone employ him for audio work?

There's a huge difference between long term employment over at least a season's worth of work and a small part as Emperor Septim in a popular game franchise.

I think if they bought Picard back and snubed Patrick, would not be a good way to introduce their show, it wouldn't go down well with the fans, or I dare say other actors.

 

[BillJ]

Animated series, Season 8 on the Enterprise D. Now THAT I would watch!!

I think TNG would be as out of place in animation as it was on the big screen.

 

[Gary Mitchell]

I'd rather have a live action Star Trek series with totally new characters than a cartoon with familiar voices.

 

[JirinPanthosa]

I wouldn't want to see an animated TNG.

There are three groups in America who watch animated television. Young kids, people who like indescriminant raunch, and college age men who like things designed for 13 year old Japanese girls. They'd probably go in the young kids direction like Star Wars.

And a TNG related project would get some ratings at least at the beginning. Heck, my 57 year old mother liked TNG so much that she asked me a couple weeks ago "I just got to season four of DS9, what should I watch next?" (She said she was going to skip Voyager. I've never been so proud of her.)

It wouldn't get the same ratings it originally got but if the show was designed as an episodic procedural to appeal to the CBS-type audience it'd do pretty darn well.

 

[Mysterion]

No. Star Trek cannot continue to feed on it's own dying corpse and survive.

There needs to be an infusion of new ideas and original stories for Trek to thrive again.

 

[RAMA]

kooky

 

[JirinPanthosa]

No. Star Trek cannot continue to feed on it's own dying corpse and survive.

There needs to be an infusion of new ideas and original stories for Trek to thrive again.

If there's ever another commercially successful Star Trek TV show, it will be the same premise as TOS but with modern characters.

 

[M'rk son of Mogh]

There are three groups in America who watch animated television. Young kids, people who like indescriminant raunch, and college age men who like things designed for 13 year old Japanese girls. They'd probably go in the young kids direction like Star Wars.

Not to generalize, though, right?
Now let's go watch some Simpsons with those 13 year old Japanese girls...

 

[R. Star]

There are three groups in America who watch animated television. Young kids, people who like indescriminant raunch, and college age men who like things designed for 13 year old Japanese girls. They'd probably go in the young kids direction like Star Wars.

Not to generalize, though, right?
Now let's go watch some Simpsons with those 13 year old Japanese girls...

There's a lot of people out there who think because they don't like something, no one else should.

 

[JirinPanthosa]

There are three groups in America who watch animated television. Young kids, people who like indescriminant raunch, and college age men who like things designed for 13 year old Japanese girls. They'd probably go in the young kids direction like Star Wars.

Not to generalize, though, right?
Now let's go watch some Simpsons with those 13 year old Japanese girls...

Simpsons goes in the 'raunch' category.

It's not raunchy by today's standards but sure was by 1990 standards. It's just shows like South Park and Family Guy that capitalized on Simpsons' success and took the raunch farther that make it so you don't put it in that category. In 1990 it was controversial just to have a family on TV that was dysfunctional.

Obviously there are exceptions, but not in money-making numbers. The anime that gets distributed to the US tends to be the anime designed for younger kids. The anime targeted at an older audience only gets seen by a small core fan base who torrent fansubs. Monster, for example, sold so badly in the first volume in the US they didn't even release the rest of the series.

And even if you like the kind of shonen anime that does get distributed in the US, you can't deny that the writers had 13 year old boys in mind.

 

[CoveTom]

You know, there's a lot of good points on both sides of the issue being made in this thread, but the rampant ageism is really throwing me.

With the exception of Patrick Stewart, the cast members are all in their 50's and 60's. Hate to break it to you, folks, but people in their 50's and 60's today live as vibrant and active lives as their counterparts who are 20 years younger. The idea that the new series would have to be set in "a nursing home," as one poster said, is just downright offensive.

Not everything on television has to feature people who are in their 20's in order to be believable or successful. I'm not saying that simply resurrecting TNG without any changes, and putting "the big 7" back in the same spots, would be the way to go. But don't discount that group of actors just because they've got a few more years on them.

 

[Amaris]

I don't see TNG returning to TV anytime soon. To be honest, I'm not sure where they would plan to go from here.

 

[Captain Kathryn]

As much as I love the era of TNG/DS9/VOY...no....no...

And if they rebooted it with new actors it just would not be the same. Picard could not be played by anyone except Pat Stewart...so...

If anything, I would love it if they made a new TV show with a different crew though.

 

[Mr_Homn]

Wouldn't mind a TNG animated season 8. All the actors doing voices with modern animation. Would be pretty awesome. It could take place years later or days later. Wouldn't matter.

 

[mythme]

If you place it "years later" then it would nullify events in all the Next Gen movies - of course there of those who wouldn't object to that.

 

[Chensams]

As I said in the other thread, as much as I would love to see more TNG, I just think it wouldn't work without Data and Spiner looks too old for the part now (unless they can CGI his face ala Prof X in X-Men the Last Stand).

That being said, I wish they would a least do some sort of mini-series or mini-movie on Netflix with the TNG crew.

 

[Praetor]

Wow. Initially kind of surprised that someone at Rolling Stone bothered to say anything at all about Star Trek, let alone something so... odd. But as someone else observed, RS ain't what it used to be.

And, to answer the writer of the article... no. Just no. It doesn't make sense at this point. While I want Trek back on TV as much as anyone, going back to the TNG well ain't it. Trying to continue TNG without TNG (on the part of the studios) is what killed it in the first place.

If anything, do "Star Trek: The Next Next Generation."