But I didn't mention TOS. 
Xon, Decker, Ilia vs. the rest of the cast
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Better question: then why keep Uhura, Sulu, Chekov and Scotty if they’ve got nothing significant to contribute? Sure, Chekov gets the spotlight in TWOK, Sulu in TUC and Uhura has a moment or two in a couple of the movies, same with Scotty.
But people move on in a military. It was stretching credibility to have those four still stick around until the end. And when they did introduce new characters, like Saavik or David, they got more screen time anyway than those four. So the new characters that they did introduce did play larger roles.
That’s modern sensibility retroactively placed on a 1960s and what would’ve been a 1970s show. Even then drama hadn’t yet created the “ensemble” cast in the one-hour drama. Sure, would’ve been nice to have a Uhura episode, but Trek wasn’t at the time designed to be about her. It was about Kirk and Spock. Always has been. Sorry to burst anyone’s bubble on that — and if that’s the case, then you’re right, TOS isn’t for you.
Roddenberry wasn’t adept at writing/producing an ensemble show. He just wasn’t, especially if you take into consideration the first two seasons of TNG, as you point out.
TNG was still stuck in an old fashioned way of telling TV stories … CorporalCaptin says it best:
TNG featured more of its cast in the third season and on, but it didn’t weave them in and out of the various stories like “Hill Street Blues” did. Even in an episode where one of the other characters wasn’t mainly featured, they still had interesting bits of interaction.
As for the movies, the secondary characters got interesting things to do occasionally (as I point out above) but they didn’t have any real growth as characters. They still were just roles doing a job, even when Sulu becomes captain.
Even if that were the case, the scripts don’t bare that out. Those characters were still relgated to button pushing and saying “aye, Keptin,” “course piloted,” and “hailing frequencies open.” Sure Rand gets a job in the transporter room, but does nothing beyond that. You could replace them with someone else and nothing would be lost expect maybe fan nostalgia.
Oh, and Roddenberry already got people telling him they want the old group back — in 1987.
Look, I’ve got nothing against the secondary characters. Uhura is one of my favorites, along with Kirk and Spock. But I don’t have rose-colored glasses. Her role, unfortunately, was not designed to be a lead one in the original series. I wish it had been, it would’ve made “Star Trek” far more progressive than it actually was. And I’m glad Uhura plays a significant role in the new movies.
We can’t keep retroactively applying what television drama is today to the original and say the show was somehow flawed because it underutilized its ensemble. It never was an ensemble show. It was never designed to be that. From the first pitch document to the first pilot to the series, it was always designed to be a show about the captain and the continuing cast was there to support that focus.
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But I didn't mention TOS.
No, but you mentioned the need for ongoing story arcs in any new Trek. And yet, one of the proven strengths of TOS had been almost a decade of repeat episodes in daily prime time syndication: ie. most episodes - indeed, everything except "The Menagerie" two-parter - could be (and were) shown in any order.
Supposedly, TOS never got the required ratings in first-run, its success was in syndication. "Phase II" would have been attempting to continue the proven recent success of TOS, but on a new Paramount network.
TNG emulated TOS's repeat success by going to first-run syndication, where it was consistently the highest-rating weekly hour of drama.
I guess because despite their grumbling they were nonetheless willing to play glorified background extra and push buttons and say "X was invented in Russia!" every episode.
Don't get me wrong now, I don't really care any more for the 4 background characters than for the "big three". They were bland and one-note and I'm all for dropping them if the replacements would have played larger roles just like Xon/Ilia/Decker in the scripts, and as you rightfully point out Saavik and David.
It's not necessary to replace an actor for the sake of realism imho. Why replace Uhura as long as Nichols is willing to say "Hailing frequencies open" and occasionally sing, when her would just be more of the same?
I thought she said that when she wanted to leave in the third season
Anyway I' a modern human in my 20s, of course I have modern sensibilities. And don't worry you don't burst my bubble, I know why I don't like TOS. However what I meant was that I might would have found some TOS to enjoy if there had been episodes centered around some of the other characters. Though as I said above they were all not hugely interesting in my eyes either.
I can already see that the Uhura episode (had it existed) would have just been about her being romanced by some powerful alien in disguise, wearing pretty dresses and singing, but not really about expanding her character, beyond perhaps FINALLY giving her a first name.
And the Chekov episode would have been about an old Soviet Colony in space or something
. Though "Wolf in the Fold" was arguably, by TOS standards, a "Scotty episode" (in the same sense that "Haven" was a Troi episode)
Oh man you can say that again. That's why I am of the camp that says Star Trek got better as a show once he played a less active role. Sure it did do a nosedive again soon after (in my eyes) but mid/late TNG and DS9 took a shape I personally prefer.
Makes me wonder how a new ST series would actually fare, would it be able/allowed to break the formula and adapt to modern standards?
Makes me really wonder why he came up with all those interesting characters if in his mind the show was going to be "about Picard and Riker"
I have to admit I've never watched Hill Street Blues and it doesn't sound like something I'd enjoy. Of course TNG was still stuck in "Status Quo is God/No ongoing Storylines" land and by the end of season 5 the whole thing started to lose air and employ increasingly outrageous plots (just look at the hordes of "long lost relatives" in season 7) However all I said it was an improvement over TOS
But you are looking at first draft "Phase II" scripts. Written before anyone had been signed, beyond expressions of interest.
As I said earlier, TOS fans attending conventions in the 70s wanted the "old guys" back, that's how we got the planned movie that became "Phase II" that became TMP.
But in 1987, ten years after "Phase II" had been planned to air, any new TOS would have required recasting with new, younger actors. Too soon, especially after ST IV had been such a financial and critical success with the origimnal cast. Jumping 78 years for TNG was a risky solution that eventually paid off.
Sure, but I was saying that, in cast-led discussions at panels at Trek conventions throughout the 70s (often when Shatner and Nimoy were too busy to join their fans), and in fanzine stories, the minor characters were seen to be undeveloped, and in need of fleshing out. The fan support of "the rest" of Trek's featured players indicated that more could have been done, and if Trek was done again on TV there was an opportunity to do so. Everyone knew that TOS "was never designed to be that". But you can't blame the unemployed, stereotyped castmembers, who were often only getting weekend work telling anecdotes, for wanting... more.
This is an aspect of the Phase II story I'd never considered before -- the extent to which it was a "make work" project by Roddenberry for the Gang of Four. If he were listening to the hardest of the hard-core fans, those who went to conventions in the mid-70s, and the actors themselves and he gave into their desire to see more of the Gang of Four, I think he would have made a grave error because he would have been putting the needs of the actors ahead of the needs of the show. I tend to agree with the Reeves-Stevens (in their book on Phase II) that the series would have been Star Trek's death knell, and the prominence of the Gang of Four would have been a factor in that.
Indeed. If "Phase II" had only got to 13 episodes, then lost Shatner as a regular, it would probably never have made it back to feature film status or another TV series. Especially if ratings were shaky, and from a fledgling Paramount network.
Yep.
Further to Allyn's comments, GR also promised Grace Lee Whitney a part in "Phase II", again at a convention - even though he didn't know what that role would be. In the "Phase II" Writers' Bible it is mentioned that Rand had been a yeoman in the past. In "In Thy Image", Rand is not only Transporter Chief, she turns up as Uhura's relief on the bridge (a communications role that followed Rand to ST VI).
The scripts were obviously written with for the cast of ((TOS-Nimoy)+ newcomers), as everyone is there but Spock. So that was the intent. If any of them failed to sign (they all did) they'd have simply been dropped.
And, yes, it's tough to judge the shows based on first drafts. I've read a bunch of them. "Kitumba" (two parter) is a wonderful idea in search of a much better pair of scripts. "The Child" is very by the numbers magical pregnancy + ship in danger + alien child story which really needed a rethink to make it any good. "Savage Syndrome" is a godawful sexist mess in its first draft form. All of these could have been made into better episodes, sure, but their flaws are obvious even in treatment form and many of those should have been addressed before they got to even the Writers Draft.
And, yes, it's tough to judge the shows based on first drafts. I've read a bunch of them. "Kitumba" (two parter) is a wonderful idea in search of a much better pair of scripts. "The Child" is very by the numbers magical pregnancy + ship in danger + alien child story which really needed a rethink to make it any good. "Savage Syndrome" is a godawful sexist mess in its first draft form. All of these could have been made into better episodes, sure, but their flaws are obvious even in treatment form and many of those should have been addressed before they got to even the Writers Draft.
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The last paragraph you quoted was more a general statement and wasn't aimed directly at what you said. More a conclusion at the end of the post, should've been more clear since it came after my response to your previous post.
Certainly, I can't blame the supporting cast for wanting to do more or voicing that they wanted to do more. Who doesn't want to do more?
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I'm going to slightly disagree with you. I doubt we'd have seen another Shatner/Nimoy/Kelley project, but sometime in the alt-past fifteen years there would have been a Star Trek film. Paramount would've said, "Hey, we own this space opera property that was kinda big back in the day. Why not develop something and ride on a wave of nostalgia?"
Phase II would have cemented the idea that Star Trek was Kirk and Spock (or, at least, Kirk). On the one hand, with Phase II we wouldn't have had The Next Generation and beyond. On the other hand, we also wouldn't have had a balkanized fandom who argued over which series and cast of characters was best.
No, I didn't do that either. I've directly quoted myself below. I was concerned, though, that my post might have been misunderstood in this way, so I'd prepared myself to elaborate:But I didn't mention TOS.
No, but you mentioned the need for ongoing story arcs in any new Trek.
The point I was getting at was that the lack of ongoing character arcs in conjunction with banal filler subplots utterly wasted the ensemble by effectively running them (or at least the "supporting legs" of the ensemble, e.g. Dr. Crusher and Geordi) through a GNDN (Goes Nowhere, Does Nothing) device, at least most of the time.
Since it was the conjunction of two things, there would have been two alternative ways to improve upon the situation. First, make the character-focused subplots more interesting. Two, have ongoing character arcs. A third way would have been doing both at the same time.
Indeed, I think it would follow that an ongoing character arc would tend to be less trite than an isolated subplot, because there would be more invested in it, as the success of the show overall would depend on it as an individual plot more. And, there is a fundamental paradox in the notion of a character-focused story in which character development is largely, if not totally, impossible (because of the episodic format); this constraint would not apply in a serial format.
But nevertheless, and whatever the root cause was, the larger problem was that (speaking just for myself) I tended not to find the character-focused subplots in TNG to be novel, much less interesting or entertaining. There were exceptions, but for the most part they were a complete waste of time. Episodes were routinely salvaged only because the remaining action/adventure subplot was interesting. Character development tended not to be the forte of the writers, and the episodic format didn't facilitate it.
Naturally, YMMV.
No, I didn't do that either. I've directly quoted myself below.But I didn't mention TOS.
No, but you mentioned the need for ongoing story arcs in any new Trek.
We are going round and round in circles here.
You missed quoting the actual bit I had responded to. Before you mentioned what TNG was to you (ie. the A/B plots), you discussed Hill Street Blue's ongoing story arcs and more soap opera quality. It seemed to me you were saying that you wanted TNG to have done this style of TV instead of the A/B plots it did.
Which is why I then mentioned that one accepted strength of TOS's longevity had been the ability to screen its episodes in syndication in any order. The producers of TNG seemed reluctant, at least until the end of Season One, to do much connectiveness between episodes, although they did introduce a few aspects, such as Q's return, and the "Conspiracy" aliens (with returning characters from an earlier episode), then the Romulans announcing their return.
Yep. And Ryan Thomas Riddle mentioned Hill Street Blues as a better use of ensemble before I did. I was following up on what he said.
The point of my post there was comparing and contrasting the respective story-structures typical of HSB and TNG. I mentioned the problem of banality twice, so I really don't see how someone could think that I wasn't also talking about that as a problem.
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