space opera's fortunes are turning around...

[Temis the Vorta]

Abrams is going for the summer popcorn blockbuster formula, not really any different from Avengers. Likable characters, slam-bang action. Star Trek is Avengers in space.

But what do we expect? It won't help anyone if his movies flop. Even the "better" popcorn movies must adhere to a pretty narrow set of expectations. The most we can hope for is that they are financially successful without being totally brainless, like Transformers and that ilk. Avengers in space is the best we can hope for (and wouldn't it be great if the next movie makes that kind of money?)

Star Trek won't be back to its old self - in the sense of being highly distinct from any other property such as the Avengers - until it's back on TV, where some degree of individuality is possible within the context of profitability.

 

[xortex]

He got rid of the mythology altogether and started a space opera from scratch. None of this is having his cake and eat it too and none of it has anything to do with TOS ever. Respect has to be earned. So far it's a ripped off waste of time and a vacuos attempt to steal Trek's thunder.

 

[TerraNovan]

Connecting Star trek to the term space opera is marking the franchise for failure. Star trek died because of its association with space opera.

Nah; the Abrams movie is right-down-the-center space opera, and it's the greatest success in the history of the Franchise. In terms of tone and character it returned Trek to something more like the style that made it a phenomenon in the first place, back in the 1960s.

Star trek isn't space opera, calling it one doesn't make it true, it's just science fiction. Far to many plots have been in the true science fiction genre to ever compare to something like star wars. Not to mention a large amount of detail on the federation that is somewhat realistic.

Just like the original movies, the big screen lends itself to simplistic ideas, the only real departure from the I-VI is big budget cgi. The star trek 2009 wasn't perfect by no means but it is something new.

 

[xortex]

For me it was perfect because I don't ever want to see it. Perfectly lousy that is.

 

[Kegg]

As My Name is Legion pointed out, Syfy has one of the best track records around with space opera TV, so I'm definitely looking forward to what their new shows look like.

As far as bitterness against the network goes: I was here back when news about Ron Moore's new Battlestar Galactica was coming out. I remember posters insisting that the Laura Roslin character was little more than a Mary Sue-insert for the chief executive of Sci-Fi (Bonnie Hammer, IIRC her name was) and the show was just more proof of what a terrible network it was.

Star trek isn't space opera, calling it one doesn't make it true, it's just science fiction.

Star Trek is not only space opera, it's one of the most iconic representations of space opera. There's little point to a Star Trek series that is pre-First Contact Earth; such science fiction depictions of the near-future are interesting but need not be tied with the Star Trek brand.

Granted:

Far to many plots have been in the true science fiction genre to ever compare to something like star wars.

This shows perhaps a little simplistic understanding of how the term 'space opera' is used today. Star Wars is a space opera, as is Battlestar Galactica, Babylon 5, Firefly, Farscape, and so on. Use of science fiction concepts as opposed to the more-fantasy leaning influence of Star Wars is not uncommon in space opera.

Star Trek is not a hard science-fiction depiction of the 22nd, 23rd and 24th centuries. It has faster-than-light travel, humanoid aliens and an assortment of god beings. It gravitates more to science fiction concepts than Star Wars, yes, but that does not magically spirit it into a new genre.

Also, DS9 was as space opera as Star Trek got. More than any other Star Trek series, Deep Space Nine focused on the politics and the galactic machinations of various alien and human political powers, which is a standard feature of space opera. This was a strength of the show, while attempts to do 'random weird sci-fi thing happening to characters' was typically a weakness.

 

[Admiral Buzzkill]

Star trek isn't space opera...

It is, and it always was. Almost every aspect of Trek was borrowed from pulp sf stories of the 1940s and 1950s.

Abrams's movie is about the crew of an FTL spaceship battling invaders from the future who are using a super-weapon to destroy friendly planets. Purest pulp - space opera.

 

[Enterprise is Great]

Connecting Star trek to the term space opera is marking the franchise for failure. Star trek died because of its association with space opera.

Nah; the Abrams movie is right-down-the-center space opera, and it's the greatest success in the history of the Franchise. In terms of tone and character it returned Trek to something more like the style that made it a phenomenon in the first place, back in the 1960s.

Star trek isn't space opera, calling it one doesn't make it true, it's just science fiction. Far to many plots have been in the true science fiction genre to ever compare to something like star wars. Not to mention a large amount of detail on the federation that is somewhat realistic.

Huh? Space Opera is a subgenre science fiction. It describes Star Trek perfectly. Saying Trek isn't Space Opera dosen't make it so.

 

[Sindatur]

Star trek isn't space opera, calling it one doesn't make it true, it's just science fiction.

I don't think that word means what you think it means

SciFi in Space, with Space Ships and Aliens - You can't get anymore Space Opera than that.

 

[MacLeod]

Star Trek would in general be classed as Space Opera.

 

[Tribble Herder]

To put it simply, "space opera" is not a pejorative term, just a shorthand description of a certain format a story or set of stories is set. Same way westerns are sometimes referred to as "horse operas".

 

[RAMA]

Space Opera: sci-fi in space on a grand scale. Yup that means Lensman, Star Wars, Star Trek, BSG, etc

A pretty interesting wikipedia entry on the subject:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space_opera

 

[Tribble Herder]

I think an important distinction is that a space opera doesn't necessarily have to be a science fiction story. It has more to do with the setting than the premise of the story.

 

[T'Girl]

A pretty interesting wikipedia entry on the subject:http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Space_opera

"there is no general agreement as to what [space opera] is, which writers are the best examples, or even which works are space opera"

Interesting indeed.

 

[Temis the Vorta]

I'm just going with a general "space adventure" definition. Anything with a starship is space opera.

 

[RAMA]

A pretty interesting wikipedia entry on the subject:

"there is no general agreement as to what [space opera] is, which writers are the best examples, or even which works are space opera"

Interesting indeed.

What was more interesting to me, is that what was seen a derogatory term has changed over the years...this is probably due to the more challenging work in literature over the last 25 years or more, and I think those would be fairly easy to name.

 

[Sindatur]

A pretty interesting wikipedia entry on the subject:

"there is no general agreement as to what [space opera] is, which writers are the best examples, or even which works are space opera"

Interesting indeed.

What was more interesting to me, is that what was seen a derogatory term has changed over the years...this is probably due to the more challenging work in literature over the last 25 years or more, and I think those would be fairly easy to name.

I've been a SciFi/Fantasy fan all my life (born in 1964), and I don't remember Space Opera ever being a derogitory term? I don't remember it being anymore frowned upon then SciFi/Fantasy in General? When was it a derogitory term?

 

[Temis the Vorta]

The first place I've ever encountered the term space opera is here. I see it as a very nichey term without much popular traction at all. Space adventure might be a more common term. Mostly, people seem to use sci fi to mean space opera, which of course is way too narrow.

 

[MacLeod]

I think Space Opera is more used for shows set in a more futurestic enviroment. Whilst Sci-Fi is just the genre of which Space Opera is a part.

 

[T'Girl]

The oldest reference to "space opera" I've encountered was in Heinlein's "Have Spacesuit, Will travel." The novel's hero Kip was imprisoned by the evil aliens in a pit, on Pluto (then a actual planet), He had a dream that he discribed as a space opera. That would have been written in the mid-fifties.

I've never heard anyone use space opera as a bad term.

 

[MacLeod]

In the UK the term Space Opera and even Sci-Fi in general has in the past not been looked on in a good light. So a certain negative conatation can be inferred with the term space opera.