Stargate: Universe is what Voyager should've been like
- Thread starter Maxillius
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Read up on what happened in 2008 regarding SGA & SGU. Syfy did want both shows and had thought SGA was going to get a Season 6, but it wasn't MGM that ended SGA, it was the producers of Stargate that only wanted to do one show, which was Universe because they were tired of doing SGA, wanted to do something different and were enticed by all the praise over the past few years for BSG, shows with very flawed characters, loads of melodrama (in-fighting= melodrama), and heavily serialized. Sci-Fi has since become a bit pissed they had a show with decent enough ratings for renewal (all episodes over 1M viewers) swapped out for a more hyped one that has produced several sub-million viewer episodes, and it's much more expensive to boot, particularly because there's talk SGU destroyed the franchise like ENT did for Star Trek (and 1 movie and 1 movie in production, while a revival, isn't nearly at the same stature as 1987-2005 was for the franchise).
Budget?? The SGU producers themselves admitted each episode cost over $1M more than SGA to make. Your talking points are for the wrong show.
And criticizing SGA for its ratings is hilarious since SGU's ratings were even worse, which led to it being the Stargate series cancelled the quickest. SGA was doing "well enough". The ratings weren't stellar, but about the only show getting great ratings for them was Eureka (BSG's ratings were weak later on and while highly praised, its ratings did not reflect that high praise). What mattered was Sci-Fi was content with SGA's ratings at the time of its cancellation.
Now that would have given VOY a more BSG vibe
Now that would have given VOY a more BSG vibe
Just saw that he was considered to play the captain on TNG before it was Jean-Luc Picard, he turned it down.
He probably was offered Chakotay, they do like to keep things "in the family" examples: Jeffrey Combs, Vaughn Armstrong, there's a few more.
If he had been Chakotay then
EDIT: The guy who played the Native American that was really the Traveller in "Journey's End" was also offered the role.
How?
Now that would have given VOY a more BSG vibe
If Olmos took the job for Voy, he couldn't be Adama.
So he couldn't give Voy. any BSG vibe because you'd never associate him with BSG anymore.
Olmos as Adama ended up being a better career move than as Chakotay.
IMO, there isn't even a cast member in Voyager in the same league as Olmos.
He can out act nearly all of them.
The scripts on Voy. never would have challenged his acting range the way BSG did.
Me personally, I also can't see Olmos putting up with Mulgrew's diva-esque attitude for very long either.
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I agree with the OP to some extent. Even though I think SGU was a bit slow in the beginning, I give them credit for at least keeping them on the edge of survival, throughout the show's run. I also like how the aliens on SGU feel a lot more alien.
If VOY had encountered the Blue guys instead of the Kazon, it could've been sweet.
If VOY had encountered the Blue guys instead of the Kazon, it could've been sweet.
Saquist
Commodore
But this "Survival" stuff just wouldn't make any damn sense given what we know about Trek: They are hardly alone in the Universe, there'd be aliens all over the place for them to get help from.
As for aliens, if they DID do something like that then the complaints would just be the opposite of the Kazon: Instead of saying they used them too much, they'd say they used them too little and we didn't know anything about them an they were a cheap plot device.
The only thing cool about the blue aliens is what they look like.
"Stargate Universe is what Voyager should have been".
Well, imagine my worst nightmare.
If Voyager, despite all its flaws is a favorite of mine, then Stargate Universe is the definite opposite of that.
To be honest, it's the worst crap in SF I've ever watched.
I atually liked Stargate SG1 and Stargate Atlantis. Not as good as Star trek but watchable with some good plots and some really good characters.
But Stargate Universe.......oh dear.
The characters are dull and totally uninteresting. The only one with some guts is Rush, maybe because Robert Carlyle is such a great actor. Ther rest are totally uninteresting.
They spent the first five epiaodes bickering and nothing happened so I actually quit watching it. Then by coincident I happened to turn on the TV when it was that episode with those pale blue aliens attacking the ship and I thought "great, finally the series is taking off", then it became the same boring mess again.
Stargate Universe is as interesting as watching a mummy dry, in fact a SF-interested relative of mine confessed that he fell asleep on two occasions while watching it.
I'm happy that Voyager never came close to Stargate Universe when it comes to characters and storytelling.
Well, imagine my worst nightmare.
If Voyager, despite all its flaws is a favorite of mine, then Stargate Universe is the definite opposite of that.
To be honest, it's the worst crap in SF I've ever watched.
I atually liked Stargate SG1 and Stargate Atlantis. Not as good as Star trek but watchable with some good plots and some really good characters.
But Stargate Universe.......oh dear.
The characters are dull and totally uninteresting. The only one with some guts is Rush, maybe because Robert Carlyle is such a great actor. Ther rest are totally uninteresting.
They spent the first five epiaodes bickering and nothing happened so I actually quit watching it. Then by coincident I happened to turn on the TV when it was that episode with those pale blue aliens attacking the ship and I thought "great, finally the series is taking off", then it became the same boring mess again.
Stargate Universe is as interesting as watching a mummy dry, in fact a SF-interested relative of mine confessed that he fell asleep on two occasions while watching it.
I'm happy that Voyager never came close to Stargate Universe when it comes to characters and storytelling.
One of the big selling points about VOY was that the ship was stranded in a totally new part of space, so I don't think we were supposed to assume that it would be so easy for the crew to find help. Also one appealing aspect of the show was that they were alone without backup from the Federation or allies like the Klingons. So survival could've been, should've been, a bigger part of the show, particularly early on.
I don't know if the people would've complained or not about the blue aliens. But I do know that people complained about the Kazon because they were Klingon knock-offs and pretty weak as villains. At least the blues have a unique character design and are mysterious. You can't easily communicate with them and they can kick your ass, unlike the Kazon who were immediately weakened by having to need Voyager's technology, and only being able to beat them in a group, not one on one.
That's why VOY's premise was flawed to begin with. Too much of past Trek had been about showing us that the Galaxy was totally full of advanced aliens, the Delta Quadrant shouldn't have been any different.
If the only way to make an enemy good is to make them "Mysterious" then you're already in deep trouble as a writer.
I suppose you hated "The Road Warrior" because Lord Humungus' Raiders needed to be in a group to take on Max and the Refinery workers?
I guess you hated how one Dominion Jem'Hadar Bug Fighter couldn't destroy the Defiant all on its' own and they usually attacked in groups?
Then again, they were once again screwed by past Trek: all the good archetypes had already been used by then for alien development. There was no way they were going to be able to make new aliens that wouldn't have some semblance of the older ones to them.
If the only way to make an enemy good is to make them "Mysterious" then you're already in deep trouble as a writer.
I suppose you hated "The Road Warrior" because Lord Humungus' Raiders needed to be in a group to take on Max and the Refinery workers?
I guess you hated how one Dominion Jem'Hadar Bug Fighter couldn't destroy the Defiant all on its' own and they usually attacked in groups?
Then again, they were once again screwed by past Trek: all the good archetypes had already been used by then for alien development. There was no way they were going to be able to make new aliens that wouldn't have some semblance of the older ones to them.
But the thing is if they stranded from away from the rest of the Federation, survival should be the theme. What else would the theme be, because often Voyager came across as Gilligan's Island in space instead.
Voyager shouldn't have been Star Gate or Battlestar, but it shouldn't have been the bad TNG clone it was either. Just because aliens could help Voyager doesn't they would, so just saying Voyager can rely on aliens to help them seems like cheap story telling. What they should have done is have better continuity and consequences. When ever the ship was damaged, it should still be damaged the next episode, get rid of the Holodeck, because having silly Holodeck stories undermines how desperate their situation is and frankly they should been way more willing to throw out the Prime Directive and trade technologies with other species.
Having silly Holodeck stories and having the ship damaged in one episode and be fine in the next just undermines the show.
Having rewatched the entire series a couple of months back, I have to say I liked it more than the first time I saw it.
Even the early seasons were quite good, even if the Kazon were weak as aliens.
I think Voy was fine the way it was. It makes sense for the Star Trek universe, where they have all these radical technologies. When you're that advanced, of course your technology is what's going to save your ass 99 times out of 100.
We could have used less holodeck though. I was also surprised to find that Seven's "sexuallity" was only really explored in 1-2 episodes in the entire series. I had the notion that I was in for nuBSG style sexuality when Seven came on board, but surprised to find very little of it.
Even the early seasons were quite good, even if the Kazon were weak as aliens.
I think Voy was fine the way it was. It makes sense for the Star Trek universe, where they have all these radical technologies. When you're that advanced, of course your technology is what's going to save your ass 99 times out of 100.
We could have used less holodeck though. I was also surprised to find that Seven's "sexuallity" was only really explored in 1-2 episodes in the entire series. I had the notion that I was in for nuBSG style sexuality when Seven came on board, but surprised to find very little of it.
"Strangers in a strange land", far away from their own society with its own customs they must learn how to adapt to their new surroundings and what culture clashes there will be.
Farscape, they rarely had any problems acquiring supplies from Commerce Hubs. There it was treated the way it should be treated: an excuse for planet/away mission episodes or a background element to justify visiting alien worlds/bases.
^ Eh, Your Milage Will Vary
I liked the Kazon, but they did come across as somewhat Klingon Clones...
Which race does this describe? "we are warriors have a system of honour and forehead ridges...but some of our race are deceptive and manipulative and despise the Federation..."
I liked the Kazon, but they did come across as somewhat Klingon Clones...
Which race does this describe? "we are warriors have a system of honour and forehead ridges...but some of our race are deceptive and manipulative and despise the Federation..."
Except Voyager shouldn't be a clone of Farscape any more then it should be a clone of BattleStar, Stargate or TNG. Plus
I don't believe most alien civilizations would want to help Voyager for nothing in return , that's not very believable, in Trek most alien civilizations have their own interests, why would the aliens in the DQ be any different?
Really Janeway being dogmatically obsessed with the Prime Directive while in the Middle of Nowhere, just seems stupid. Being obsessed with rules and regulations while beyond the frontier just came off as idiotic. Sometimes circumstances dictate you have change the play book, if not throw it out and write a new one. Kirk knew that, he had more of a safety net then Janeway, even Picard knew that.
So Janeway's inflexible worship of rules and regulations that likely don't work in a lot of the circumstances they are facing just really drained the life out of the show. That's one of the biggest problems, if I were trapped on a island with other people, I wouldn't dogmatically obeying rules and regulations from the regular world, I would adapt my tactics to each situation. That's the problem, Janeway was beyond the frontier into the true unknown, having worship Star Fleet Regulations makes little sense, especially since a third of crew have no reason to respect those rules and regulations.
Then just have them get Neelix to tell them what counts as currency and base a plot around them either doing jobs for money/repairs or using the Replicators to produce trade goods while making sure they don't mess up the local economy too much. There, easy and gets a story arc out of it.
Most of the time the locals or the Kazon wanted free tech from them to use as weaponry to destabilize the region for their own ends. You can't just cave and give in when you know billions of innocent people are at stake. And you think they'd stop with just Replicators or Phasers (both of which are very revolutionary pieces of tech that would seriously screw things up in the wrong hands)? They'd gut the ship for everything and enslave the crew.
You don't just throw out the rulebook entirely when things get a little dicey (and Voyager's situation was hardly unique, it happened to Kirk and Picard!). A lot of those rules would have been written WITH their situation and blind exploration in mind!
It would have helped if they better defined the PD in relation to their situation though. Made it less confusing.
But all civilizations wouldn't be like, some would want to trade, they would want technology instead of money. To me that's part of the change the Voyager crew should have made, being more willing to bend the PD, because them conforming to rules that were not meant for the situation doesn't make sense.
Yes, but that doesn't mean there are not reasonable civilizations who would be willing to trade technologies, in a deal that benefits both sides. Why shouldn't Voyager do that?
The difference is Kirk and Picard got their crew home at the end of the epsiode, not in 7 years.
Besides Kirk disobeyed the PD all the time. Even Picard has mentioned there times when breaking the PD is approiate for the situation. So making Janeway into a zealot obsessed with the PD, when she is in a situation her it should matter less, doesn't make sense. Voyager almost always lacked continuity and consequences, too often the script was written so Janeway was 100% right and that's just boring. She hardly ever had to make tough decisions and I don't count Caretaker because I thought she was being massively incompetent in that story.
Too often Janeway was written like a Mary Sue. Heck I'm wondering why more of the crew weren't a tad resentful of her for getting them stuck there in the first place. I would be pissed if I was stranded somewhere due to someone else foolhardy choices. Making Janeway into a zealot and Mary sue really sucked the energy out of the show.
Also Voyager lacked any real feelings of progression. The fact that Harry Kim always reminded an Ensign, he never had a chance to shine and get promoted. Also their return home was out of the blue, it had no build up, there was no reason to care about their return when it was so lazily written. Stuff like that really hurt the show.
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