I think Sammo Hung would be a better example, since he was actually a lead on TV. In my view, the scripts to Martial Law were terrible, though, and that worked against the show in a big way.
I think Sammo Hung would be a better example, since he was actually a lead on TV. In my view, the scripts to Martial Law were terrible, though, and that worked against the show in a big way.
I don't know enough to know whether the aggregate data can be explained by industry discrimination, a determination of what's marketable, which would plausibly involve audience prejudice, or a combination. Probably a combination. But, if the audience is prejudiced, how does that help make a show with a minority lead successful?
Even a decade ago it was considered remarkable to have John Cho as a romantic lead opposite Karen Gillan in Selfie. Takei's odds in 1995 would have been extremely long.
You also have the problem that if a show fails, you never really know why. Audiences react for a variety of reasons, and you can only make somewhat informed guesses as to what happened. If a show with an Asian lead fails, is it because the audience was prejudiced? Or is it just because the show was bad? Or was it because the marketing was crappy and the audience didn't know about the show? Etc.
Interestingly, looking at Star Trek, the Berman-era shows with the black captain and the female captain were more successful ratings-wise than the final Berman-era show with the white male captain. Does that tell us anything about audiences views on race and sex at the time, or not? I have no idea. Probably not. But it's still an interesting thing.
So, your answer is ONE?
You can always find an exception to a rule, but the sad fact is Hollywood tends to favor certain types over others.
Norman, coordinate!
That's not exactly true. The additions to the model that were added for Generations -- so they could be damaged by the Nexus but leave the underlying model intact -- turned out to not be removable without damaging the model, which is why when the model was seen next as the Lakota, it still had the Generations modifications.
A hypothetical 1995 Sulu show would probably begin with the ship coming out of a minor refit to upgrade the secondary hull.
I highly doubt they would have used the same Excelsior model from 1986 for a tv show being produced in 1995. Even without the Ent-B modifications, the model would have been too old (and too large) for the rigorous use it would receive as the hero ship for a multi-year tv show. I think they would have done exactly what they did for ‘Flashback’: built a newer and smaller filming model.
But the reason they did that for "Flashback" was specifically because the hero model originally made for TSFS had been permanently changed for Generations and "Flashback" was a unique case of needing to match what had been seen in a previous film, not just needing a generic Excelsior class ship.
I don't think it was because they needed a newer or simpler or smaller model for a TV episode. If that were the case, why didn't they do that for "Paradise Lost" over on DS9, which was the same year as "Flashback"? It used the original modified Excelsior model. The Lakota did quite a bit in that episode, yet they apparently found shooting with the original ILM model to work just fine.
I wasn't trying to argue for or against the quantity of Asian actors, I was just naming one very famous actor from that time.
Hollywood is more diverse today though
Well that's all down to creatives versus studio/network.
The network just wants a hit show, so if they've just had a hit show they want more of the same.
But writers want to be creative and do something new. I think for all the faults in the execution, the premise was solid and set up something distinctive from both TNG and DS9.
An Excelsior show definitely wouldn't have done that.
Flashback and Paradise Lost were individual episodes. Using the original Excelsior model for 182 episodes would have been too much for a model that was already 9 years old and would not have been logical. The reason why Jein built his model at a smaller scale was because it was unnecessary to recreate the original’s size, and used less materials, still looked realistic, and was most likely far easier to film.
Thank you for the insight on the models. May I ask some ignorant questions?
- Are they used so much that they get worn out? I thought that the production company created a library of stock shots which were re used which would imply they aren’t being shot all the time.
- what was the size difference you mention? Was it extreme? Does size/scale matter on a small level? We’ve all see the huge 1701 at the Smithsonian and also the smaller model back in Rods care.
- is is less expensive to rebuild or refurb vs new build?
The use of practical models was a cool era. Thank you
The main reason for replacing the movie models for an ongoing TV series would have been that Image-G didn't really have space to shoot large models. The TNG 6-footer looked incredible with ILM, but was cumbersome for a TV series. So they replaced her with the 4-footer.
So yeah, a model that was smaller, lighter and easier to move would have been preferred.
So yeah, a model that was smaller, lighter and easier to move would have been preferred.
It the books Harriman stepped down as captain and Demora takes over
All models will degrade over time when being used for productions lasting seven years.
Yes, there's stock footage. But you will always need to film new shots of the model doing whatever the script has it doing.
Bill George's original Excelsior was quite large, because it was meant to be seen on a large theater screen and have lots of detail. Nobody had a tv screen larger than 32 inches (and more likely 13 inches on average) in 1995, so detail wouldn't have been as big a factor.
Obviously it's cheaper to refurbish a model that already exists than building an all-new one. But there are more factors that go into what model ultimately is needed for the production. As @Tomalak mentioned, space (as in studio space) is a big factor, as is the ease with which cameras can move around a model.
I'm assuming that was from that Tomed Incident novel, which I find hard to believe that she was still serving on the Enterprise-B for so long that she went from ensign to captain of the same ship.
18 years. Picard held his command crew together across two ships for almost as long. In some aspects, like promotions and assignments, Starfleet doesn't work like a modern military.
Oh yes, I know. That’s what I find unbelievable. There’s no logical way Picard’s crew would have still been serving with him (through two different ships no less) for as long as they did. At the least, Riker, Data, Geordi etc. should have been given their own commands after the Ent-D was destroyed based on their ranks and experience. There was absolutely no reason for this crew to stay together through four feature films other than at the scriptwriters’ whims.
I think it felt a bit more like a stretch in the novels because we didn't have many Enterprise-B stories (it would've been more reasonable for Chekov to become the captain in one of the movies since we saw him go from a fresh-faced kid to grizzled Psi-Cop; I feel like "Captain Chekov" is probably in one of the unmade "getting the band back together" concepts they threw around, and there's also the impersonation bit in TFF), and because there were really only two named characters from the movie, so the straining from the dramatic necessity of keeping someone recognizable on the ship decades later really showed.
I would have vastly preferred a more flexible cast. Television drama in the 80s was developing the idea of short-term cast members -- they show up for thirteen episodes or a season, and then they move on somewhere else -- and Star Trek never got on board with that. Especially Deep Space Nine; Starfleet characters should have been rotating in and out with more regularity, imho.
Exactly. It's one of the unforgivable sins of First Contact, in my opinion. It makes no effort to justify having a status quo that, cosmetic issues aside (uniforms and ship) is indistinguishable from the status quo of two years prior.
