What Took So Long...why we're only getting a new movie now...

I love how, in the absence of any hard news, this forum has been largely kept alive by Spock/Uhura/Kirk fanning threads and the countdown, and now all hell breaks loose.

 

What took so LONG? I'm surprised it's this soon, to be honest with y'all.

Movies take years to make. Especially ones as tech-heavy as Trek films are. The gap of four years in between films does not seem surprising at all.

 

Amen. And it should be clear now that, as far as Ian is concerned, this was not really about the scheduling at all. That was just another excuse to bash the new direction, pine for the previous regime, and, once again, suggest that anybody who likes the reboot is somehow spitting on Gene Roddenberry's grave.

For the record, I have been a Trekkie my entire life, have watched at least two of the earlier movies this week, and am hard at work on my umpteenth Trek novel . . . so don't tell me I "hate" the old stuff just because I don't think a four-year gap between movies is a crime against the Federation!

Hell, for someone who "hates" the old stuff, I sure watch a lot of it!

 

I've never been in a cult before. COOL! Excellent...

(For those who are already members of the Berman/Braga Cult, let me interpret my previous comments for you: "KEWL! We are pleased...")

I'm off to learn how to chant...

 

While I certainly agree with everybody who said that three years isn't much of a wait, I wonder what's wrong with the Manny Cotto/Reeves-Stevens suggestion? I thought these were the writers the fans liked?

Plus, no more Abrams, no more lens flare.

And no, that doesn't make me a member of the "hate the reboot" crowd, I'm just curious, is all.

 

"Have you seen the great new Star Trek movie yet?"

"No, I've moved on to other things."

"But it's really great! And you loved the last one!"

"Nah, I've moved on to other things."

Not likely to happen.

 

Oh, I don't think anybody has anything against the writers in question. Indeed, nobody but Ian seems to think we're on a vendetta against anyone associated with the earlier versions. Hell, I've written the jacket copy for some of the Reeve-Stevens' books . . .

We're just rolling our eyes a bit at the idea that there's actually some urgent need to replace Abrams with anyone . . . because he's not making the movies fast enough?

Please!

 

Although I don't think four years is that bad a wait, I do think the video in the OP makes some good points. STID was green lit before Trek XI's release, and the main cast was already signed on for a sequel, and a release date of summer 2012 was already locked in. But then Abrams and his cohorts took their time with the script. Abrams, Orci or whoever frequently saying (beginning in 2009, in fact) "the script will be completed by the end of the month." The script didn't actually get completed until last year, and their languid pregress on the script resulted in the movie getting delayed until 2013. That's some month, it lasted three whole years. Yes, you can say "it took time to get it just right" all you want, but why are you spending three years promising a script will be done by the end of the month? They should have kept their mouths shut and worked on the script. These guys are very good at keeping their mouths shut when they want to.

And then I'm not even going to get into how they handle the tie-in material. Pulling the novels at the last minute, demanding direct supervision over the comics and YA novels (to the point that a few YA novels have even been delayed due to having to wait for Bad Robot's approval of the latest draft), you get the idea. Bad Robot may have successfully brought Trek back into the limelight, made it cool, and all that. But I still think they're mishandling it.

But in the end, they do stick butts in the theatre, so I guess that's all that matters.

Too many problems with that.

-They don't have experience with movies, just TV shows. And novels, in the case of the Reeves-Stevens. It would bascially be a repeat of the TNG movies.

-You wouldn't attract any non-fans who really are integral to Trek's continued survival. Coto was the guy who turned Enterprise into weekly fanwank, and just read one of the Reeves-Stevens' books and tell me a non-fan is going to understand it. Hell, even as a die-hard fan, I have trouble following their books at times.

 

Don't worry, judging by the trend in recent movie making we will get a 2 parter next after Into Darkness that will be shown almost back to back with no more than 6 months in between...


...one can hope.

 

Because neither fans nor journalists are ever happy with the phrase "No comment".

A promise that they'd like to have a script completed at "the end of the month" may well have been their intention, but there were definitely other press releases explaining why there were several delays, and what else they were working on at the same time. They begged off with Paramount to do some other scripts first, IIRC.

The principal actors and guest artists all had to lock in filming schedules that fitted with their busy careers - all of them have had numerous roles between ST films. It's not like TOS and TNG movies where many of the two casts were surviving on weekend convention appearance fees.

But you did.

Perhaps because they were busy writing scripts? It is highly possible some of the four novels encroached on the ground they were preparing for the movie. They might have had to order partial rewrites without telling the novelists exactly why rewrites were required, then checking the manuscripts again - when they should have been working on their movie script. The IDW comics were told exactly how to proceed - mostly remaking old TOS episodes that Orci & Kurtzman knew were either totally safe ground, or, were placed somewhere they could pull an appropriate easter egg for the new movie. The four novels were not developed that way. As an afterthought, Pocket pulled them "for now".

Because they know we will complain if the tie-in writings make even one mistake in their extrapolations from the last film.

Because... they were busy writing the movie sequel script and planting possible easter eggs into the IDW comics?

Bad Robot! Bad, Bad Robot!

 

It would be a pretty sweet way to celebrate the 50th anniversary. Part 1 in May 2016, Part 2 in November.

 

Not particularly. They produced some good entertainment for a few weeks but it was, as a rather notorious friend remarked, nothing more than a reach-around for the hard core fans who'd stuck with Enterprise into its fourth season. Nothing special, nothing really any more memorable than the rest of the series (or Voyager, or...) and certainly nothing to give Star Trek much-needed new energy and a direction into the future.

We're far better off with Abrams.

 

Honestly, the whole situation with the tie-ins makes them look like obsessive control freaks, and I really don't think such a mentality is healthy for professional movie producers.

 

Saw, Paranormal Activity, Police Academy and Friday the 13th pumped out a new movie every year. Is that the quality you're shooting for?

 

^^At least when those script writers say they'll have it done by the end of the month, they'll have it done by the end of the month.

 

They should hand Trek over to The Asylum to make a few movies.
They seem to be fast and on time too.

 

I'm honestly okay with them pulling in the reins of the "EU". Flooding the market with never-ending low quality tie ins and rushing scripts to production seems like a bit of a return to the 90s/00s Trek to me...

 

That's beside the point. If they really had a problem with the Abramsverse novels, they should have acted a lot sooner than after the novels had been written and had cover images and back cover blurbs publicly released.

 

Why? What does that matter?

 

People today are spoiled.

I remember the early 70s when the only Trek was the reruns. It wasn't even called TOS then because it was The Only Series. TAS hadn't come along yet, and Phase II wasn't even a gleam in Roddenberry's eye. We waited 10 years for the first movie, and had no idea if there would ever be another one.

After NEM and ENT Paramount could have just let Trek die, and no one could blame them if they had.

In the grand scheme of things, four years is hardly the wink of an eye.