Scifi Franchise Story/Concept Diversity: How much can you accept?

[Gotham Central]

I was having a hard time coming up with a title for this thread so I hope it makes sense.

First, think of your favorite scifi franchise/universe (Star Trek, Star Wars, Stargate, Firefly etc).

Think about what you like about those franchises.

Now ask yourself how much deviation from that formula could you accept before it stops "feeling" like that franchise/universe and diminishes your enjoyment of the stories?

I say this because I'm constantly baffled by people that seem to have a fairly narrow view of the sorts of stories that they will accept within a given universe.

For instance, think of the flap that occurred amongst Trek fandom when DS9 was announced. To this day there are people that dismiss the show because it was on a space station and did not routinely feature exploration. The focus on politics and war seemed to really turn some fans off. As a result, it was probably the most "different" of the Trek TV concepts, but as an experiment, it was never tried again.

The whole idea that something is "not Star Trek" if its not on a ship baffles me. The creators of the franchise have built a vast an complex universe to play with, yet many people want to limit the storytelling potential of that universe to a fairly narrow format. One of the things I really appreciate about the novels is that we DO get to see a side of the Trek universe that is often beyond simple starships and galaxy exploration. Articles of the Federation showed us the inner workings of the Federation government. Department of Temporal Investigations: Watching the Clock, showed us the lives of Federation (non-starfleet) time agents and the madness that they must contend with trying to preserve the timeline. Vanguard gave us another space station, but one that managed to be very different from DS9.

Its the diversity of potential stories within a given universe that I love. I have a hard time saying that something is "not Star Trek."

You saw the same uproar in Stargate fandom with SGU. Not only was the setting different, but the tone shifted to match the dire circumstances that the characters found themselves in. It interesting that on some level people complained about Stargate: Atlantis because it was in someways too much like SG1. Yet others complained that SGU was too different.

What makes each of these universes unique? Can radically different stories be told within these universes and still feel like they are a part of the larger tapestry?

Would you accept a Star Trek series set thousands of years after the Federation or before the Klingons, Romulans or Vulcans?

Would you watch a Star Wars series set before the birth of the Republic or the rise of the Jedi/Sith? No light sabers, droids etc?

What about a Stargate series set after the secret of the SGC/IOA has been revealed and Earth has emerged a galactic power...thus no longer fully reflecting the modern day environment?

 

[FordSVT]

I'm not really sure what the line is, it's more like a feeling. If so much is missing that I find myself wondering why they didn't just create a new property instead of whoring a brand name, I'd say the line has been crossed.

It's similar to the way old TV shows or books are brought to film. Sometimes, it feels like something completely new that is merely capitalizing off of an existing brand name instead of continuing it. A show like SGU (which I enjoyed) brushes up against that line, but I don't think it crosses it. It still featured the gate system and built on technology and story lines that had been built up over a decade of SG1 and Atlantis.

A "Star Wars" show with space ships but no force, light sabers, Jedi or Sith wouldn't feel like Star Wars, it would simply be a generic sci-fi action show.

 

[Venardhi]

On the other hand, Star Wars that is constantly packed full of Jedi and Sith doesn't feel right either IMO. It is one of the major reasons why I haven't gotten into most of the Prequel-Era material.

 

[Warped9]

It's a good question touching on all the discussions, debates and arguments in any franchise whenever a corner is turned.

In the beginning I resisted TNG and for a long time I was quite critical. But not long ago I revisited the series and found there was a lot more I liked or at least could accept than I remembered. A turning point for me wasn't the concept or premise itself but when I felt the series got mired in a general blandness somewhere around mid run. Funny, in some ways I find much of the early seasons of TNG (1-4) feeling more like Star Trek than most of the TOS based movies. When it really comes down to it the TOS films work because of the cast carrying them because I find a lot of the content wanting.

I initially took to DS9, but after a couple of seasons it wasn't so much the subject but more the style of how the show was written that turned me off. To me it stands out like a sore thumb, but thats me. Both VOY and ENT had (more or less) valid concepts, but by then I could no longer accept the way the shows were done and they were perhaps too much of same old, same old.

I could have gotten behind a reboot of TOS, but I was horrified to see what I saw as a complete re-characterization of the subject. They turned it into something else and dumbed it waay down.

The Star Wars prequel trilogy was just uninteresting. They were too focused on a story we all knew how it was going to end. The just wasn't enough novelty mixed in with the familiar. I also felt they didn't have the same touch of humour and fun the original trilogy had.

Part of why I didn't take to SGU was because I felt cheated with Atlantis which was left rushed and unresolved.

It's a difficult line to define and everyone will define it differently.

 

[MacLeod]

Viewers as a whole are impossible to please, no matter what you do some part will complain. Make another show set in the same universe too similar to another and the fines will cry we want something different, do something different and it'll be this is too different.

Personally I liked SG-1, SG:A and SG:U.

As for the Trek shows, I think VOY failed to live upto it's premise (or at least my interpretation of the premise, for me it was too similar in style to TNG when it should have been different (that isn't to say VOY didn't have its moments) as for ENT it finally began to do what it should have been doing from S1 in S4.

 

[Temis the Vorta]

I had to click on this thread, just to see what the frak the title meant!

Now ask yourself how much deviation from that formula could you accept before it stops "feeling" like that franchise/universe and diminishes your enjoyment of the stories?

This is impossible to answer, because it depends on how tightly or loosely defined the franchise is. Star Trek is loosely defined and therefore expansive, and could cover a lot of different approaches. It's basically an idealistic future in which liberal humanitarianism is shown to be triumphant across the galaxy despite all odds.

So, does that mean you have to tell the story from the point of view of Starfleet, as the representatives of liberal humanitarianism? No, you could tell the story from the POV of their foes, or you could have other main characters (some alien species) that also espouse those values and maybe want to join the Federation but are being prevented by something.

How about those "odds" - how grim can they get? Pretty grim, I'd say, beyond what DS9 ever depicted, as long as there's some glimmer of idealism and hope in the situation.

As for Stargate, I have no idea what the concept there is, other than it's fun to watch military types running around setting C4 to blow things up. In that case, I would be in favor of some concept being developed for the franchise that has a little more value in it. I did like the notion of SGU making a big change, only it wasn't a change for the better. If someone took a crack at it again in the future, I'd happily check it out, but it's gotta be more than just "let's try to imitate nuBSG and be all gritty and dark."

A "Star Wars" show with space ships but no force, light sabers, Jedi or Sith wouldn't feel like Star Wars, it would simply be a generic sci-fi action show.

Star Wars needs to be built around the Force, and the philosophical clash between light and dark. Jedi and Sith are mandatory if they are the only way of embodying that clash, which (not having read the books) maybe they're not.

Light sabers are optional, since you could have the clash without them (although it wouldn't be as cool looking) just like you could have Star Trek without phasers. Space ships allow you to have a big, expansive playing field, which suits the epic theme of an eternal struggle between good and evil, but technically I guess you could do without them, too.

 

[Sci]

I think it depends on which unique traits a given franchise brings to the table. In general, my sense is that a given franchise will tend to have certain thematic concerns, and that something that utterly betrays those themes or which drops those themes, has probably dropped the ball and would be better off as its own independent franchise.

For Star Trek, for instance, there's a constant thematic concern with the idea of building a better society, with the value of exploration, with the need to learn from others and overcome our differences and live in peace. DS9 deconstructed a lot of that, but it also reaffirmed a lot of that.

 

[Methos]

i'd say the main thing that matters to me in a franchise, whether it's books, TV, cinema, comics or whatever, is continuity... that's the most important thing to me when it comes down to it...

if you're jumping about all over the place, with storylines that contradict each other and 'retcon' previous storylines with little or no sense, then i'm not going to bother even trying to ratify it in my mind, i'll drop it there and then...

I can cope with a lot of things from sci-fi shows, from the outright bizzare (Weird Science Tv series), to the good idea but badly executed (Timecop Tv series), right through to the pathetically underfunded (Dark Angel)

But the continuity and storyline has to be there... i've dropped out of Tv shows and comics very quickly before when they start ignoring continuity, typically when a new writer comes in and decides to do it their way...

there are only very few TV series that can get away with altering continuity and do it well, i can think of 3 off the top of my head, and they all deal with time travel, so it's to be expected lol

M

 

[MacLeod]

Continuity isn't everything in a show.

As you say continuity in time travel shows can be somewhat lax, DW has to be the classic example of this.

Of all the ST shows VOY is often considered to be one of the shows with weaker continuiy. i.e no back-up for the EMH. Only for one to magically appear in a later episode (albeit a good episode). Now that oversight could have been fixed by dropping a line in a previous episode saying they had managed to design a way in which the EMH's programme could be backed up each day.

SW at it's basic is the old Good vs Evil trope, you don't need the Jedi or the Sith to appear but they maybe at the very least need to be seen/mentioned as influncing actions according to their respective belifs.

 

[Warped9]

There will always be a measure of retreading of certain ideas and elements. In a way thats rather like comfort food. But if you keep going back to the same old over and over and over and over again then the property has indeed veered from what made it work. You need a good measure of novelty mixed in with a spicing of the familiar.

 

[23skidoo]

As you say continuity in time travel shows can be somewhat lax, DW has to be the classic example of this.

Except at the same time it still has overall continuity. Yes, we can argue over whether "The Stolen Earth" actually happened now in the wake of "The Big Bang", but the lead character we see on screen is still the exact same man we saw in the junkyard back in November 1963 (just with a new face). If they suddenly began telling stories that reset everything, and tell his story in a completely different way (as was the original plan for the Fox TV movie back in 1996, and is allegedly what David Yates has planned for his nebulous movie version) it wouldn't necessarily feel like Doctor Who anymore.

There's also a subjectiveness involved in terms of how a show is presented. There are those who don't accept TNG or DS9 or certainly ENT because they don't feel nor look the way TOS did (sole exceptions being one-offs like Relics, Trials and Tribble-ations and In a Mirror Darkly which intentionally impersonated the style of the TOS filming format). I've seen the same statement expressed by those who can't accept slick, all-film-looking, high-budgeted Doctor Who because to them Doctor Who is videotaped on cheap sets, telling stories that take a month or more of weekly chapters to unfold. Yet the DW revival - and certainly the now-25-year-old TNG era - have certainly spawned many fans who no longer see TOS or the classic-era DW as representing what they feel Trek and DW should be, whether in terms of storytelling and subject matter, to simple cosmetic presentation. It was one of the rationales I heard behind the whole TOS Remastered thing that involved replacing the original SFX with CGI because the powers that be feel today's audiences won't accept the plywood and wires SFX of the original. DW has seen a small effort in that direction too.

It's why remakes have such a hard time being accepted. People get used to the way a show was presented, its storytelling, the actor chemistry. Rarely, very rarely, they get it right - the Get Smart remake did manage to recapture most of the magic of the original series because it didn't deviate that much from the show. More often they "lose the plot" - I Spy and Wild Wild West come to mind. That doesn't mean a film can't be well-received and a hit, but at the same time the hits are usually separated from the originals and aren't considered "the same". Tom Cruise's Mission Impossible films have nothing in common with the 1960s TV series. And fans of 21 Jump Street expecting a remake that recaptures the magic of the original series will be disappointed - but the remake did well because it was considered a good film on its own merits. Of course, there is a threshold even for this - I remember some folks lambasting the first two Tim Burton Batman movies because they weren't campy and funny like the Adam West series (and when Joel Schumacker actually did this with his two Batman films, especially the last one, they crashed and burned with audiences and killed the franchise for years; ironically there are people such as myself who can't get into the Bale Batman films because they went too far in the other direction and simply aren't fun films anymore - I'm hoping the arrival of Catwoman in the new one will help a bit).

Alex

 

[Admiral Buzzkill]

Just make something that doesn't bore my ass off and I'm fine.

 

[bullethead]

I can accept a wide divergence within a franchise if there's a logical explanation for it in or out of universe, the characters are interesting, and the writing is good. If not, I'll either stop watching (Enterprise) or continue watching to see how bad things get (SGU).

 

[MacLeod]

Some franchies like DW and St are almost 50 years old, it is only natural for their to have been change over that period. Technology improves, audiance tastes change etc..

Shows like DW and ST are open to a wide concept given their nature.

DW is about an Alien and his Blue Box which can visit any planet in the universe at any point in it's history. Can you get a wider arena in which to tell stories.

In the ST franchise 4 out of the 5 shows were set onboard a starship, the other being that other common thing in space based shows a Starbase. It's not so much the setting as the stories you tell.

 

[Snaploud]

I think Treklit benefits from the fact that different branches of that universe will continue in some form within the next several months. We don't have to settle for just Department of Temporal Investigations stories or just Vanguard stories. We'll get a new Trek novel in our favorite branches in the relatively near future.

On television, though, we're pretty much stuck with just one incarnation of Trek for years if not decades, so we're bound to get more grouchy when the latest tv show appears lacking in some way.

 

[Enterprise is Great]

Just make something that doesn't bore my ass off and I'm fine.

Preach it, brother!

 

[milo bloom]

i'd say the main thing that matters to me in a franchise, whether it's books, TV, cinema, comics or whatever, is continuity... that's the most important thing to me when it comes down to it...

if you're jumping about all over the place, with storylines that contradict each other and 'retcon' previous storylines with little or no sense, then i'm not going to bother even trying to ratify it in my mind, i'll drop it there and then...

I can cope with a lot of things from sci-fi shows, from the outright bizzare (Weird Science Tv series), to the good idea but badly executed (Timecop Tv series), right through to the pathetically underfunded (Dark Angel)

But the continuity and storyline has to be there... i've dropped out of Tv shows and comics very quickly before when they start ignoring continuity, typically when a new writer comes in and decides to do it their way...

there are only very few TV series that can get away with altering continuity and do it well, i can think of 3 off the top of my head, and they all deal with time travel, so it's to be expected lol

M

I have to agree with this also. I never had a problem with the concepts of DS9, but then a lot of folks will agree that the show picked up when they added the Defiant.
It's when we get things on TNG like O'Brien's shifting rank, or Worf getting his back broken and then he's fine next week that cause me grief.

As for VOY and ENT, both had good ideas, but it was the execution, as MacLeod points:

As for the Trek shows, I think VOY failed to live up to it's premise (or at least my interpretation of the premise, for me it was too similar in style to TNG when it should have been different (that isn't to say VOY didn't have its moments) as for ENT it finally began to do what it should have been doing from S1 in S4.

VOY is a great example, incredible setup, but then they played it safe for 7 years (with an occasional dip of their toes into the deep end). When Moore did his BSG reboot with the intent of telling the story of a lost ship dealing with those real consequences, I wasn't interested at first because I wasn't a fan of the original show. I happened to catch it when the first season was in repeats and fell in love because it was so well done. I did try to go back to the old series and give it another chance, but no dice.

 

[Admiral Buzzkill]

Most people who say that they have "high standards" where pop culture is concerned go on to demonstrate that what they actually have are very specific expectations.

 

[milo bloom]

Most people who say that they have "high standards" where pop culture is concerned go on to demonstrate that what they actually have are very specific expectations.

Are you saying those people give things like poor writing and acting a pass as long as the specific story points they like are being done?

I'm not sure that's a terrible thing, there's some dodgy acting in, say, the various incarnations of Star Trek, but if the specific story is being done well, then you can overlook minor things.

If you're referring to something like the frequent comparisons of nuBSG and VOY; well, that's just because you have similar ideas and one was done better than the other. If UPN wanted another TNG, then they should have said so from the beginning. I would have even accepted Voyager maybe encountering a race with a powerful communications network that allowed them to contact Starfleet who then gives Janeway a new mission of exploring and making friends, maybe alongside this new civilization, so that they were no longer "lost in space", but just on a "really damn long field trip".

 

[Methos]

I wouldn't say i have very 'specific expectations', but i want to enjoy a show from week to week without fumbling through storylines that the writer has chosen to change half way through or ignore completely in favour of a new direction...

it's called "good writing", and it's something i greatly cherish in Tv shows, books, comics and any other media i wander towards

M