Why does DIsney hate "Earth Star Voyager"?

[Ian Keldon]

"Earth Star Voyager" was a pilot for a Disney series proposal in 1988 that was to be a competitor of Next Gen. The pilot was aired as a Disney Sunday Night Movie, but not taken to series.

Over the years, the project has developed a cult following, and fans are constantly asking about a DVD release. Disney won't even admit that there are fans asking, let alone fess up to what several were told when they were able to talk to people at the studio. They were told in effect that it will NEVER be released, and that the only way they will ever see it again is as a bootleg video.

Why would Disney leave money on the table like this? What do they have against their own project and it's fans? It would be a simple thing to do to put the project up on BoD (Burn on Demand) status.

Why does Disney seem to hate "Earth Star Voyager"?

 

[Nerys Myk]

Never heard of it. Possibly many people at Disney haven't either.

 

[C.E. Evans]

Earth Sta--what?

 

[Morpheus 02]

i loved the movie (a 2 parter, actually)...and had a crush with the Asian girl who was quickly put in hibernation.

I'd love to see it on TV, at least. Duncan Reghr (sp.) was in it, from a number of sci-fi fantasy series, like V and the "Dungeons & Dragons" -type series (i forget the title , i think it was on CBS).

 

[auntiehill]

I sincerely doubt anyone at Disney "hates" it. It's a product that was seen as a failure and shelved. They don't seem to think that the expense of releasing it will be worth their while. Plus, there are always behind-the-scenes problems we never know about: copyrights and lawsuits, who owns what, etc. There's no emotion like "hate" involved; it's strictly business.

Like Nerys said, it's been so long and it's so obscure, I doubt most people in the company know anything about it.

 

[Tiberius]

I remember that show. It was cool. I'd love to see it on DVD!

 

[Mike Farley]

The 8 or 10 people total who will buy this will not offset the cost of producing it.

 

[Morpheus 02]

True, but it should be worth playing on the Familyy Channel...couldn't cost more than the other movies they play!

 

[Agent Richard07]

I think the pilot will be available someday, somehow.

Earth Sta--what?

It was a four-hour Disney mini series about a ship called the Earth Star Voyager that was sent out on a mission to explore the distant planet Demeter 3 to see if it was suitable as a new home for mankind. Since the journey would take about 26 years, the ship's crew was made up of young people in their teens and early 20s so that they could survive the trip.

Here's the intro...

[yt]http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=WFgLL8EN71I[/yt]

You can watch the whole series on YouTube. Here's the first part to get you started.

I didn't know until recently that it was the pilot for a TV show. I've been thinking for a few years now that it would be nice to have a reunion movie where they've reached their destination. Well over two decades have passed, so the time is about right. It won't happen, but it's a nice thought.

 

[Ian Keldon]

For those of you who don't know:

http://en.wikipedia.org/wiki/Earth_Star_Voyager

http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0095077/

And there are apparently a LOT of fans. They just don't get the exposure of Trekkers or Browncoats.

 

[Mage]

I watched half of that intro..... the fact that the entire crew is teens and tweens already puts me off....

 

[DWF]

Personally I liked the miniseries and it was nice kind of backdoor pilot for a possible series. And I'm sure somebody at Disney has a list all of their shows and movies that aren't out on DVD yet. But outside of their most famous and biggest money earners I doubt if Disney as a company cares about releases some of their older stuff.

 

[Mike Farley]

It's an entire ship of Wesley Crushers.

 

[Brolan]

It's an entire ship of Wesley Crushers.

The horror! THE HORROR!!

 

[Greg Cox]

I sincerely doubt anyone at Disney "hates" it. It's a product that was seen as a failure and shelved. They don't seem to think that the expense of releasing it will be worth their while. Plus, there are always behind-the-scenes problems we never know about: copyrights and lawsuits, who owns what, etc. There's no emotion like "hate" involved; it's strictly business.

Like Nerys said, it's been so long and it's so obscure, I doubt most people in the company know anything about it.

Yeah, I'd guess there's some sort of messy rights issues gumming up the works. And it's probably not worth unleashing an army of lawyers to sort it out.

That's just wild speculation on my part, though.

 

[Mr. Laser Beam]

It's an entire ship of Wesley Crushers.

The horror! THE HORROR!!

Shakaar is also in it, though, so it can't be all bad, eh?

 

[TemporalFlux]

This is how Disney operates. It's why we don't have the final episodes of Gargoyles on DVD; it's why we still don't have all of the Marvel animation stuff on DVD; it's why we never had a classic Power Rangers release while Disney owned the property. Disney gives up on home video *very* easily; it's not their priority beyond milking their classic animated features (and not even all of them - a Treasure Planet bluray is pretty much a pipe dream).

 

[Robert Maxwell]

This is how Disney operates. It's why we don't have the final episodes of Gargoyles on DVD; it's why we still don't have all of the Marvel animation stuff on DVD; it's why we never had a classic Power Rangers release while Disney owned the property. Disney gives up on home video *very* easily; it's not their priority beyond milking their classic animated features (and not even all of them - a Treasure Planet bluray is pretty much a pipe dream).

Disney's under no obligation to put out anything they don't consider profitable enough to be worthwhile.

 

[cylkoth]

Why does Disney seem to hate "Earth Star Voyager"?

Because it was kinda....boring?

Admit it...as much as we liked it, it was pretty boring. So boring that a heavily edited version (the one that's on youtube) replaced the original in subsequent Disney Channel re-airings.
But there are plenty of boring titles released on dvd each year, so it is rather odd that they'd sit on a genre property that could very well sale enough to justify a disc release. Or at the least, stream in on a pay site like Vudu to gauge the response.

 

[ATimson]

Disney gives up on home video *very* easily; it's not their priority beyond milking their classic animated features (and not even all of them - a Treasure Planet bluray is pretty much a pipe dream).

Bah. There's only three non-Pixar movies I want on Blu-ray, and that's one of them. (The others being Atlantis - also not likely - and Lilo & Stitch.)