"Stigma": A Harbinger of the Death of Trek

[DarthPipes]

Stigma wasn't a bad episode but it was twenty years too late. What actually annoyed me the most about it is that T'Pol is left with a serious medical condition and it's completely ignored for a season-and-a-half. Absolutely no mention of it whatsoever until the final episode of the Vulcan arc in Season 4 when it's finally brought up and cured in about two seconds. This showed how lazy the show could be with recurring storylines and I think T'Pol's condition would have been a better excuse for her behavior in Season 3 than the contrived drug addict storyline. That did her no favors whatsover.

A Night at Sickbay was Archer at his worst. He acts like an unprofessional jackass who stupidly brought his dog down to a homeworld of a race of aliens who are insulted easily. Then he risks the security of his ship because he's pissed over his dog. ANAS could have been used as a textbook example of why Archer shouldn't have been given command in the first place. The Seventh isn't much better for him either, as he acts like a total baby in front of his crew because he's upset that T'Pol can't tell him anything about the Vulcans mission. Despite the fact that she is under orders not to do so.

 

[3D Master]

Everything that stagnates, dies.

That sums up Star Trek pretty well, especially with Voyager and Enterprise. Enterprise was nothing but a carbon copy of Voyager and TNG, while this one should have been totally different.

In fact, they actually had the premise that would make for something totally different. Enterprise should have been SO different, that only hard-core fans knowing the references to the 22nd century inside out, could have recognized it as Star Trek, and only BECAUSE they know those 22nd century references, know what the place was like.

In such, no Vulcans on the Enterprise - we've seen enough of them already. An Andorian on the bridge instead though. The ship too, should have been hopelessly primitive. People should have been dying all the time - no phasers, no phase canons, not even hand laser guns - nothing of the sort.

If Enterprise was that different, more casual viewers wouldn't recognize it as Star Trek until well after they were sucked in.

But alas - the irony is, that the suits wanted a "Star Trek" show, with everything that is "Star Trek", because that's what Star Trek viewers want, that's what minimizes risk, and that what would keep them watching, when this very attitude, did not produce a less risky show, it produced a more risky show - in fact, it produced a show that just about anyone with a brain would see failing from the onset, by the sheer virtue that Star Trek needed a chance because more and more viewers were running off. Ironic, indeed.

 

[Anna Yolei]

In fact, they actually had the premise that would make for something totally different. Enterprise should have been SO different, that only hard-core fans knowing the references to the 22nd century inside out, could have recognized it as Star Trek, and only BECAUSE they know those 22nd century references, know what the place was like.

That's just it. Who in this world today would watch a real true sci-fi series on regular air-waves? (LOST isn't Sci-Fi, for the sake of this argument) The two biggest Sci-Fi franchises are the ones with a lot of back-history, Star Wars and Star Trek. A LOT less familiarity would have been nice, but to remove every single aspect most likely would have put off more people than it drew in. Even most of the canonites on this board just wanted to see more TOS referrences.

 

[3D Master]

Anna Yolei said:

In fact, they actually had the premise that would make for something totally different. Enterprise should have been SO different, that only hard-core fans knowing the references to the 22nd century inside out, could have recognized it as Star Trek, and only BECAUSE they know those 22nd century references, know what the place was like.

That's just it. Who in this world today would watch a real true sci-fi series on regular air-waves? (LOST isn't Sci-Fi, for the sake of this argument) The two biggest Sci-Fi franchises are the ones with a lot of back-history, Star Wars and Star Trek. A LOT less familiarity would have been nice, but to remove every single aspect most likely would have put off more people than it drew in. Even most of the canonites on this board just wanted to see more TOS referrences.

No. :Sorry, but... sighs:

There was no way you could put off more people than it drew in, by the sheer fact that were hardly any viewers left! 12 million viewers in the pilot - barely a third by the end of the first season, and more would go away away.

If you had something that was an ACTUAL prequel just about everyone of those 12 million would be watching. Why do you think most of them left even after nothing but a pilot?

"Hey? It's just stale crap all over again - and this supposed to be a bloody prequel to?" :zap:

"Hey? I thought the producers said this would be something totally different? Without the cheezy weekly aliens. But look... cheezy aliens." :zap:

"And it's even remakes of earlier episodes!" :zap:

"It's bad remakes to boot." :zap:

The casual zapper sees but one frame, "Oh, Star Trek". :zap:

You lost everyone BECAUSE there was no change, BECAUSE it was so recognizably Star Trek. It should NOT have been.

 

[pookha]

3D Master said:No. :Sorry, but... sighs:

There was no way you could put off more people than it drew in, by the sheer fact that were hardly any viewers left! 12 million viewers in the pilot - barely a third by the end of the first season, and more would go away away..

which by the way has been a pattern of almost every trek except for tng.

deep space nine actually had a greater drop off through its run then enterprise, and this was with the addition of a tng character.

really across the board in recent years most tv shows have lost overall audience since there is so many options.

yeah things could have been done like maybe delay the temporal cold war stuff to help the show but it had many bigger factors like local stations selling the space for sports knowing the show would repeat over the weekend.

i just dont see trying to please what probably is less then a couple of thousand die hard fans would have made a big difference.

 

[Anna Yolei]

3D Master said:

There was no way you could put off more people than it drew in, by the sheer fact that were hardly any viewers left! 12 million viewers in the pilot - barely a third by the end of the first season, and more would go away away.

Fair enough.

If you had something that was an ACTUAL prequel just about everyone of those 12 million would be watching. Why do you think most of them left even after nothing but a pilot?

Because they just didn't care?

"Hey? It's just stale crap all over again - and this supposed to be a bloody prequel to?" :zap:

Causal viewers (which account for most ratings) probably can't tell if it's "stale crap all over again."

"Hey? I thought the producers said this would be something totally different? Without the cheezy weekly aliens. But look... cheezy aliens." :zap:

Again, causal viewers aren't online to memorize every word the producers say, and they don't have many expectations, if any.

"And it's even remakes of earlier episodes!" :zap:

"It's bad remakes to boot." :zap:

See point one.

The casual zapper sees but one frame, "Oh, Star Trek". :zap:

Hey, if it weren't for Enteprise, I would have NEVER watched this show! It was the vague knowledge I had of past Treks that I gave this show a shot (And the fact that my crush at the time was a Trek fan didn't hurt, either )

You lost everyone BECAUSE there was no change, BECAUSE it was so recognizably Star Trek. It should NOT have been.

Taking away everything Star Trek would have killed this show a lot quicker than it did die, IMO.

That said, I concur that some things (Such as Ferengi and Borg) didn't belong in this series. At all. For the fans, there are some details they could have taken care of (Hull plating, as an often-quoted example).But overall, the thing that killed this was bad writing across the board. If there's a fanfic I enjoy, for example, about an anime fandom of mine and the writer doesn't know some fact I do about Japan--something really anal, like kids changing thier shoes before going into a school--it doesn't bug me so much if the fic is decent. If the characters are out of character and the plot makes no sense, it'll irk me a LOT more, but it still woul;dn't be the thing that kills the reading experience, ya know?

It's the same thing here. And to an extent, your posts demonstrate exactly *why* it's hard to cater to fans in this fandom. Each fan has his or her own set of what constitute "good" Trek and not many of them will settle for anything less. We can all agree good writing and good characters are important, but besides that, you get all sorts of ideas going in a hundred different directions. Even the much-beloved TNG was met with petitions to cancel the show even before it aired! WTF?

 

[3D Master]

AAARGGH!

Sorry, but you people are deluding yourselves! Star Trek's reputation is crap. Just about everyone considers it juvenile crap (and guess what, since Voyager it IS!)

Just about everyone who comes across Star Trek will immediately zap away. And one of the biggest things to remind them it's Trek: Vulcans.

The few, small number of people, who actually would have given an entire episode of Enterprise a shot, would never again watch because after an episode it's done, they'd go: "Yep, juvenile crap."

Star Trek needed a change, because it's been the exact same (with one somewhat exception DS9) for 15 years straight, and for a decade straight of that, audiences left. Instead, they produced more of the same - when it should have been completely different. Whatever people you might have lost because it wasn't like Star Trek, you'd gain no doubt tenfold.

 

[Captain X]

A lot of people consider sci fi in general to be nerdy and juvenile, and Star Trek is just recognizable. Oh, and your average person thinks of TOS and/or TNG when it comes to that too. I've been teased enough for being a Star Trek fan to know that from personal experiance.

 

[3D Master]

Captain X said:
A lot of people consider sci fi in general to be nerdy and juvenile, and Star Trek is just recognizable. Oh, and your average person thinks of TOS and/or TNG when it comes to that too. I've been teased enough for being a Star Trek fan to know that from personal experiance.

Right, that's why Star Wars is the biggest grossing movies ever, that's Jurassic Park is the same, that's why ET is way up there as well. It's why Super Heroes movies are super grossers, why The X-Files was so popular, same with Lost and Heroes... oh, wait, that kinda shows the opposite doesn't it?

If it's good SF, people will watch, plain and simple. And the average person considers TOS and TNG the same because they don't know any better - not because they've actually watched it regularly and experienced it.

 

[commodore64]

Isn't Trek all about the idealism of human nature? Even in the very first episode, Trip makes a comment that mankind has managed to wipe out famine, war and other dreaded problems. I think that is the very epitome of what Trek has to offer -- it's the idealistic side of sci-fi.

Still, no matter how 'bad' you may think the stories are, it's still better writing that is what may be out there on most sitcoms and many drama shows.

Since you responded to me, I feel compelled to respond to this statement. First, I quite liked Enterprise. It had a lot of flaws, some fatal and probably got the series killed.

I think any crap television should be killed outright. I hate the realism shows (Big Brother, Dancing with the Retards, etc.). Those should die, but unfortunately it's not up to me. I can comment about what didn't work for ENT -- and I do as part of the forum. I selfishly hope other people are reading and deciding what makes good television and writing and what doesn't.

For example, it'd be cool if when Trek comes back, and it will, it didn't fall into the same traps it did for ENT. All new traps would be good.

The other thing that's weird for me is that many viewers knew what would make good television. It's like this forum became an idea generator. I remember in season 2, when I joined, people were already talking about ENT focusing an episode around Vulcans, Orion women and more. Seems like a no brainer, why it took others so long? Have no clue. And yet I'm really concerned with the lack of quality and consistency in season 4.

What carries most of those dramas/police/medical stories are the characters.

That's not true -- it's the blend of good plots and excellent characters with that can't identify quality that speaks to people.