The Legacy of Harve Bennett?

[Red Ranger]

Turd Ferguson said:

Red Ranger said:
People,

Well, so much to say. I'll start by saying Harve Bennett and Nicholas Meyer did help revive ST. They took some chances, like killing off Spock and showing an aging Kirk.

That's all well in good, taking chances. Killing Spock. Giving Kirk a son. Making Kirk an Admiral. Blowing up the Enterprise. Kirk facing court-martial.

But, what's the point in taking these chances if everything's going to be reset at the end of the film(s)?

Spock comes back to life.
David gets killed.
Kirk gets the Enterprise-A.
Everybody's back at their posts smiling.

The status quo has returned. WTF? How's that taking chances?

Ah, yes. The original reset button, years before TNG and VOY!

I should've been clearer. They did take some chances, but they didn't let them stick, which is too bad. But let's not forget that it was backlash from the fans which led to Spock coming back -- as well as Nimoy's realization that without Spock to fall back on, he was going nowhere fast!

It would've been interesting if only, say, Kirk, McCoy, and Scotty were left from the original crew and Saavik and other younger officers replaced Sulu, Chekov, and Uhura. Then it really would've been the next generation!

They could've established they broke up the crew, with Sulu taking command of Excelsior, only with Chekov as his first officer and Uhura as second officer. Kirk, McCoy, and Scotty would've taken over the new Enterprise.

I actually liked how they brought Spock back, though, partly because it was preposterous, and how the writers left several outs for the character to come back.

It would've been better if they either got the Excelsior, or another Excelsior-class vessel -- NCC-2001 -- as the new Enterprise. I understand that was originally what TPTB intended to do.

So, some missed opportunities. Oh, well!

Red Ranger

 

[cardinal biggles]

^And ironically, it's us fans that torpedoed them! We brought this shit upon ourselves!

(I am of course using "us" and "we" in the general sense; between 1982 and 1986, my primary interests were Sesame Street, LEGOs, and Knight Rider. )

 

[Jonesy]

TiberiusK said: The investment always returned a profit, even when the job was botched (Shat's TFF). The only film that lost money was Nemesis.

Well, by the numbers, TFF barely eeked by with much of any kind of profit (27 mil budget versus 70 mil worldwide gross). If we're talking 8 million, yes then perhaps (halving the 70 mil gross for the studio) but I doubt the studio was that happy with it - particularly in the wake of TVH's box office.

 

[Jonesy]

UWC Defiance said:

Allyn Gibson said:
Actually, Berman was there before Roddenberry. Joel Engel lists Berman as involved in the pre-Roddenberry TNG developed by War of the Worlds creator Greg Strangis. Berman's role probably would have been as the studio suit, to make sure that the studio's interests were being looked after.

This is true. Berman's job was overseeing certain areas of TV development. He was put on to TNG as a producer in order to help actually get the show on the air on time and on budget.

I've always looked upon Rick Berman as perhaps one of the luckiest men in modern hollywood. If you go by his IMDB resume, his greatest claim to fame prior to TNG was as a friggin PA in "Re-Animator". I've heard him somehow associated with "Cheers", but there is no mention on his resume of just what exactly he did on the show. Was it craft services? Errand boy?

 

[Therin of Andor]

Jonesy said:
I've heard him somehow associated with "Cheers", but there is no mention on his resume of just what exactly he did on the show.

Before TNG he was "director of current programming" and "executive director of dramatic programming" at Paramount.

Memory Alpha says: "... A prolific documentary filmmaker in the 1970s, Berman travelled extensively throughout the world, visiting over ninety countries. As an independent producer in the 1980s, Berman produced several informational series for HBO and PBS, including 'The Big Blue Marble' for which he won an Emmy Award in 1982. Coming to Paramount Pictures in 1984, Berman served as director of current programming and executive director of dramatic programming during which time he supervised television series including 'MacGyver', 'Family Ties' and 'Cheers' - appearing in the final episode of the latter as a bar patron.

 

[Peach Wookiee]

^I'm going to go out on a limb here and say if Berman hadn't thought like a TV person in regard to most of the TNG movies, they might've been stronger.

 

[siskokid888]

Nebusj said:

siskokid888 said:
Kirk attacks, he outwits, he overcomes. He never brooded and let things come to him, and then let Spock save the day.

In the Original Series Kirk never brooded? Are ye quite sure of that, laddie?

Aye, when he brooded in TOS, he did it in private, to McCoy or occasionally Spock. He never let it affect how he dealt with the situation at hand.

 

[Shatinator]

Hey Vejur--"TVH was funny but not really Star Trek movie per say" WHAT'S This--Why???

BTW Beaker full of death- --------------------
"The way to stop discrimination on the basis of race is to stop discriminating on the basis of race."
--Chief Justice John Roberts, Parents v. Seattle School District
OMGAWD--I would expect this level of intellectual analysis from a talk show host of celebrity guest on Sesame Street...but, I guess this shows how the administration considers the importance of intelligence as a qualification.

 

[cardinal biggles]

Shatinator said:
BTW Beaker full of death- --------------------
"The way to stop discrimination on the basis of race is to stop discriminating on the basis of race."
--Chief Justice John Roberts, Parents v. Seattle School District
OMGAWD--I would expect this level of intellectual analysis from a talk show host of celebrity guest on Sesame Street...but, I guess this shows how the administration considers the importance of intelligence as a qualification.

In the future, please save comments like this for private messages (which I realize you don't have access to yet) or TNZ. Or better yet, just let discretion be the better part of valor and don't comment at all.

 

[Sharr Khan]

Agreed, but by the same token, Kirk would not let his "mid life crisis" effect his thought process or performance as a starfleet officer,

That's such a 24th Century mind set. Why give the guy a mid life crisis if its not going to effect him or the people around him? And Kirk is human, he maybe a StarFleet officer but that doesn't change that fact.

Human's have mid life crisis.

Sharr

 

[Stardate]

Shatinator said:
Hey Vejur--"TVH was funny but not really Star Trek movie per say" WHAT'S This--Why?

I have a thing about time travel in Star Trek i dont like it but regarding TVH when 80% off movie happened in 1986 and not in 23th century plus storylines is pretty much about culture shock between those 2 times and getting those 2 whales i always kind a look at THV as a comady movie with Star Trek actors starring in it.

 

[Shatinator]

Vejur said:

Shatinator said:
Hey Vejur--"TVH was funny but not really Star Trek movie per say" WHAT'S This--Why?

I have a thing about time travel in Star Trek i dont like it but regarding TVH when 80% off movie happened in 1986 and not in 23th century plus storylines is pretty much about culture shock between those 2 times and getting those 2 whales i always kind a look at THV as a comady movie with Star Trek actors starring in it.

Vejur, intresting take..I can respect and understand your criticizm in reguards to ST4. Though, by that logic "Return to tommorow" & "Assignment Earth" are not real Star Trek as well, Yes?
They are afeter all containing not only time travel but conflict based on cultural diffrences.

 

[Stardate]

Shatinator said:

Vejur said:

Shatinator said:
Hey Vejur--"TVH was funny but not really Star Trek movie per say" WHAT'S This--Why?

I have a thing about time travel in Star Trek i dont like it but regarding TVH when 80% off movie happened in 1986 and not in 23th century plus storylines is pretty much about culture shock between those 2 times and getting those 2 whales i always kind a look at THV as a comady movie with Star Trek actors starring in it.

Vejur, intresting take..I can respect and understand your criticizm in reguards to ST4. Though, by that logic "Return to tommorow" & "Assignment Earth" are not real Star Trek as well, Yes?
They are afeter all containing not only time travel but conflict based on cultural diffrences.

well maybe alwas is overstated but usually feel about TVH like comady. i am not denying its Star Trek and those time traval episodes with TOS were good Star Trek episodes they were created basically showing us cultural and sosial issues in 1960s from respective from enlightened 23th century Humans.
Time traval episodes(plus time travel/hologram episodes) have then been overused in Star Trek so i am fed up with them.

 

[phrog]

From Memory Alpha:
"In an interview for the book "Captains' Logs", Harve Bennett blamed the movie's (TFF) failure on Star Trek: The Next Generation. "

Does anybody have this quote? I'd love to hear the justification for THAT. I respect and appreciate everything Bennett did while with Trek, but that sounds pretty far out as an explaination when that movie has so many demonstrable problems besides some abstract influence from TNG.

 

[TiberiusK]

Bennett quoted in Shat's Star Trek Movie Memories, pp. 267-268

"By the time Star Trek V came out, the appetite had been diffused. The fans were less hungry. Star Trek: The Next Generation was into its second successful year... instead of having to go out to the theaters, the fans were getting served warm turkey without ever having to get off the couch."

(He says more but I'm too lazy to type it all right now.)

 

[Anwar]

So he's angry at TNG for being sucessful? It's not like the TNG team were trying to get the audience away from the movie theaters and onto the TV.

 

[Therin of Andor]

Who says he was angry?

He was more philosophical, IIRC, trying to come up with other reasons for ST V (other than "bad film, bad director") to keep raking in $$$$ after its opening weekend. After all, people had flocked to the other movies, even the oft-proclaimed long, boring one - TMP - over and over and over again, but many only saw ST V in cinemas once.

 

[KyleCHaight]

Well, Bennett probably had a point. Word of mouth spreads around that the new "Star Trek" movie isn't all that good; meanwhile, TNG's episode "A Matter of Honor" in the second season garner's Trek's highest rating ever; it's not entirely unbelievable that many people would have opted to stay home and watch free good Trek rather than pay for mediocre Trek.

 

[jbake]

Anwar said:
What I never got was why Kirk was so down about being 50, when Picard was about 60 when he took command of the Ent-D and never showed any signs that he was depressed by his age.

I feel , the differences are due to the TOS and TNG life spans.

While 70 and not 50, is considered old today. 50 was old in the mid 80s. The way Shatner played Kirk in TWOK, was not only as a 50yr old in the trek universe, but as how a 1980s 50 yr old man would behave. To me, it seemed that humans in TOS and the TOS movies only had a lifespan of 80yrs


However the human lifespan in Picard's time was 150. So Picard wasnt old, but instead a young mature man in his time (about late 30s/early 40s by our standards)

 

[Peach Wookiee]

An interesting point, jbake. But could 50 have been what 30 was in the 80s?