Should these movies have been serialized?

[Lance]

Ahhh....no. Especially when we consider the leisurely four-year gap between Star Trek (2009) and Into Darkness, which is worse than the average wait between Star Wars movies when their up and running through a trilogy (and today's SW movies have shortened the gap, while ST is making us wait and wait...). I think the movies are fine as they are for the most part, and it's nice that there are some consistent narrative threads continuing between them.

One of the things that bugged me at the time (and bugs me even more in retrospect) was that Into Darkness was released four whole years after the first movie, but was only set a mere matter of.... months(?) later. It seemed to me that the actors were all ready to take the characters in new directions and show how they've grown in that time between films, but that the script and production were still in the orbit of the 2009 movie, trying to follow it up with a direct sequel and 'pulling back' on the character development to some degree. It's a bit like how The Motion Picture was made 10 years after TOS but tried to convince us it's only set two years later, it's like it stretches credibility a bit.

To me then, the first two movies do feel kind of serialized, like they're "Part 1" and "Part 2" of one story (the 'Abrams years', if you will), and that it wasn't really until Star Trek Beyond came along that I really felt we finally got a 'new' story that forged it's own path, unencumbered by being linked directly to the previous movie(s). And IMHO it was all the better for it.

 

[The Wormhole]

I just remember being pretty damn angry at the end of the first Pirates of the Caribbean movie, having not known that it was going to be a cliffhanger. I never bothered to see any of the sequels because of that.

The first Pirates of the Caribbean didn't end on a cliffhanger, only the second one did.

I wonder if Beyond 'failed' because general audiences were expecting a Khan followup. Even we here were considering the possibility until we knew otherwise. They may been waiting with baited breath for that sequel but lost interest when they understood a new direction was taken.

People were expecting a Khan follow up? First I've heard of that. Anyway, it should have been obvious we weren't getting that as soon as the casting was announced and Benedict Cumberbatch wasn't included.

 

[Lance]

The first Pirates of the Caribbean didn't end on a cliffhanger, only the second one did.

I think there was an 'after credits' scene suggesting the possibility of a sequel. Not a clifffhanger as such, admittedly.

 

[Khan 2.0]

One of the things that bugged me at the time (and bugs me even more in retrospect) was that Into Darkness was released four whole years after the first movie, but was only set a mere matter of.... months(?) later. It seemed to me that the actors were all ready to take the characters in new directions and show how they've grown in that time between films, but that the script and production were still in the orbit of the 2009 movie, trying to follow it up with a direct sequel and 'pulling back' on the character development to some degree. It's a bit like how The Motion Picture was made 10 years after TOS but tried to convince us it's only set two years later, it's like it stretches credibility a bit.

Yes a 4y wait was quite amazing, even more so now (I'm sure the non trekkie audience were like 'who are these guys again?' ..'what version of Trek is this again?',.. 'oh wow they rebooting the original Trek?!.. oh wait didn't they do that before at some point?'...'oh this is the sequel to that movie from...the last decade?'). And then to set it a few months after the first film..just like TOS-TMP!

I wonder if Beyond 'failed' because general audiences were expecting a Khan followup. Even we here were considering the possibility until we knew otherwise. They may been waiting with baited breath for that sequel but lost interest when they understood a new direction was taken.

a Kirk v Khan v Klingons battle movie probably would've pulled in the 500m ww everyone was expecting it to do

 

[Visitor1982]

I love serialized movies, so yes, that would have been my choice.

 

[The Wormhole]

I think there was an 'after credits' scene suggesting the possibility of a sequel. Not a clifffhanger as such, admittedly.

There is an after credits scene, but it's just a cute joke involving the monkey. Hardly sequel fodder, and if that angered someone so much they refused to see the sequels because of it they've got some weird standards.

 

[seigezunt]

whoops. Maybe I saw the second one, then.

I think there was an 'after credits' scene suggesting the possibility of a sequel. Not a clifffhanger as such, admittedly.

 

[ISS Enterprise]

Feel they should've been not serialized but tied together or fitting together like The Dark Knight trilogy - each movie was unique but was tethered to the previous movies to build develop the characters n arcs

Agree w earlier poster who said STID was 4 years after 2009 but set just under a year after ST 2009 and characters needed to grow n move towards tos versions.

Star Wars has their movies tied together so audience buys in n isn't starting completely over w each new movie n the box office reflects that

I feel general audiences come in w Trek based on that particular movie. So you're rolling the dice each time.