Star Trek: Prodigy Day - 28th October #SaveStarTrekProdigy

Save the date!

Star Trek: Prodigy fans on Twitter/X are going to get the hashtag #SaveStarTrekProdigy trending on International Animation Day in support of the show finding a new network or streaming service. Supporting the shows renewal will also help support the writers and cast who are now on strike, proving that there is true value in their work.

#SaveStarTrekProdigy

 

This is also because the TPTB left Prodigy out of their Star Trek Day, btw.

If they do not bring this show back as an animation, then maybe they could bring Prodigy Season 2 back as a mixed live action and part animated production, but still aim the show at young adults/young minded adults?

Some of the non humanoid characters such as Zero, Rok and Murf could be animated and digitally inserted in to episodes, but in a higher resolution and rendered a little bit more realistically with better textures and bump mapping. Dal, Gwyn, Chakotay, Okona and Janeway etc. can be filmed physically with the roles going to their original actors such as Kate Mulgrew and Brett Gray. They would have to keep the cartoon design aesthetics though and try to make the makeup and hairstyles match season 1, but at the same time trying to make it all look a bit more realistic. There is precedent for doing this as Strange New World brought the Lower Decks toons to life, and I bet *that* sounded like a silly idea at first too.

It could all still be set on the USS Voyager A, but they would still need to physically build the sets.

Think ‘Guardians of the Galaxy’… but more animated.

 

Do we have evidence that Prodigy was running at a loss? I assumed that Prodigy was cancelled for other reasons. I thought that the most likely reason for the cancellation/suspension of the series was a conflict of interest with *another* potential upcoming show such as Legacy or Academy.

In the case of Academy, the series concept would be very similar to Prodigy season 2, but in Prodigy it would have Dal and the gang training and learning on the job aboard the exciting USS Voyager A rather than being stuck at the boring Academy having to put up with soap opera melodrama and high school antics.

In the case of Legacy, there may be characters that Terry wants to use which Prodigy currently has ‘ownership’ of such as Janeway. Legacy may not be ‘family viewing’ much in the same way that a lot of Picard was not, so TPTB may wish to avoid using characters such as Janeway in both a show aimed at a younger audience and a more adult orientated show at the same time.

Or maybe Prodigy was cancelled because JJ Abrams was worried that Dal and the gang would stop the destruction of Romulus and wipe out his Kelvin universe?

Someone should ask Kurtzman why Prodigy was cancelled, but I’m not sure if he would be allowed to answer at the moment.

 

No evidence this is the case.

Nope.

 

Must not have been making enough money then…

 

The odds are very good this is the case, and has nothing to do with Legacy or another show. Studios all across the world are tightening their belts as far as finances, and the show showing the least profitability is going to be cut. That's it. No conspiracy, no one people going "We must prevent this show from taking our precious."

Just business.

It's unfortunate, and it sucks for all of us who like Prodigy, but acting like this is some conspiracy ignores what we can actually do for the show.

 

Actually, I thought that Prodigy season 2 was ‘in the can’ having already been produced? Surely all that the show needs is a streaming service or network willing to pay for the rights to broadcast an already finished product?

If the show is not sold to a network or streaming service, then any losses from making the season cannot be recovered… Prodigy may have to be sold to a network at a loss in the worse case scenario rather than not sold at all, the alternative being season 2 of Prodigy being left in a rusting film canister in Alex Kurtzman’s basement gathering dust instead? Surely Kurtzman has wages to pay or has he given the Prodigy staff an IOU?

Because of the WAG and SAG strikes, there will not be as many high quality TV shows and movies available over the next year or so. The streaming services and networks *should* be hungry for high quality content and be in the process of snapping up whatever they can before ‘the well dries up’.

Prodigy is in my opinion now a high value ‘hot property’ that networks should want to snap up to fill the upcoming void of fresh new entertainment productions.

This next begs the question of if Prodigy could be purchased and broadcast/streamed at short notice by anyone willing to buy the show, then *why* was Prodigy not included in Star Trek day celebrations? Technically, Prodigy is *still* a current show… it just does not have a home at the moment. They would just need to market season 2 *really* well, giving the season a decent advertisement budget.

I think that they should double the asking price at *least* for Prodigy now, making the networks wish that they would have bought the rights whilst it was still going cheap!

 

Because it's not streaming anywhere.

So it's hard to show a show and then say "Nope, can't watch it anywhere, save for maybe purchase a bluray." Which can run afoul of false advertising claims, a cost few businesses want to deal with.

I mean, yes, they need someone who is willing to purchase the rights. If not, then Paramount can decide if they want to put it back to Paramount+ (and the continued costs that incurs) or can it completely it and move it towards a tax right off, recouping some costs, even if not all the costs.

Again, this is ignoring the belt tightening going around across the industry because streaming is languishing in terms of profits and then the strikes come along too. All of that stacks up against the studios in terms of throwing out more money.

 

Besides the much higher costs for live action, there are also other things to consider: as things are, it is easy to get semi-retired (or otherwise older) actors to come back for a non-demanding voice role that is recorded quickly. Coming back for long shooting days while being covered in make-up may not be as attractive.

I'd argue that Prodigy also has charm thanks to its specific style of animation, which allows the production to do things that live action couldn't do (or that would be very expensive) and to get a cinematic look and feel.

See the vehicle replicator duel between Gwyn and Rok and the Protostar on Murder Planet, for example.

Moreover, characters like Rok wouldn't be possible in live action (and Zero far more difficult), and always mixing live action with animation/effects isn't the ideal way to produce an entire show IMO.

What could be is that the new streamer, assuming Nickolodeon also stops funding the series, may opt to shift the tone of the series slightly to somewhat older viewers (as opposed to the very youngest viewers partially targeted by Nick). But that depends on their strategy and on talks with the producers and the owners of the property, CBS Studios.

We don't know what Prodigy was doing as the numbers of streaming services (and of Nickelodeon, for that matter) aren't public, and difficult to interpret as well. The goal of the show was probably mostly to bring in the very youngest viewers, and it may not have been sufficiently succesfull at that goal. It could have quite a few viewers, but may not enough viewers who would subscribe to P+ only because of Prodigy. It may have turned a profit, but less so than other existing and potential P+ properties (such as Picard/Legacies but also Yellowstone, for example), and thus not be seen as a particularly good investment.

Another thing to consider is that the lack of reach of P+ (market share) may have been a negative thing for the potential of Prodigy and a move to Netflix or Amazon could increase the audience due to higher visibility on a popular service, potentially making such a move interesting both for the competing streaming service and for producer CBS Studios.The latter may even be willing to lower profit, directly on Prodigy, if the calculus is that over time they would gain viewers for the other shows due to "indoctrination" by Prodigy.

As for Romulus, while I understand the sentiment, there is (so far) zero indication it won't happen in the Prodigy timeline. I wouldn't be angry if it did happen by any means, but the Hagemans and Waltke have always said they talk to and coordinate with the other shows and we have seen signs of this in the finished product (the episodes in the Romulan neutral zone being a clear example of the influence of Picard on the show).

 

Spoiler: Season 2

This means that the unexplained event which triggered the slow burn Supernova of the Romulan sun has occurred in the prime timeline, meaning Prodigy can no longer rectify this problem without time travel. Perhaps Voyager A has this special mission but I cannot imagine a 25th century Voyager A being a time ship, the department of temporal investigations and interventions would surely not allow this? Starfleet would not take a ship away from the evacuation of Romulan space without good reason or cause. Sadly, rescuing Chakotay would not be sufficient reason to remove Voyager from the rescue efforts… the needs of the many outweigh the needs of the few, or the one. Again, reaching Chakotay would also require some form of time travel in order to arrive at the exact point of time that he was deposited on future Solum. It is also possible that future Gwyn has already rescued Chakotay as she has foreknowledge of events to come.

This is all speculation, any future replies probably do not need spoiler tags?

 

It's far from certain there will be a future Gwyn. That's only the case if there is a timeline where Gwyn goes to Solum, fails in her mission, stays on the planet and survives the apocalyptic war that follows. And even then, the timey-wimey wormhole would have to lead to Solum in that specific state, it could just as well lead to Solum as it was in the original timeline (with Diviner and Redeemer, but without Gwyn).

If Gwyn is succesful in her mission, the war would not occur and she would likely leave the planet later to rejoin Dal and hopefully enter Starfleet.

Whatever the official mission of Voyager-A is, no doubt Janeway will go or Chakotay, one way or another.

 

Are kids shows in general profitable anymore? I mean, they used to make their money from merchandising... but TV-themed toys seem to be less of a thing now.

 

Netflix has several shows in the Prodigy category, and as Netflix is not a charity (far from it...) they must be profitable in some way.

 

All the more reason for them to snap up this sweetheart of a show. I might even subscribe to them out of gratitude.

 

Arghhh. Now I'm even more pissed off at Paramount for taking it away from us.

 

Don't we have a fan fiction section?