Decline of the space opera genre

[Thanas]

To be fair, most of NuTreks problem were caused by the writers strike, for example the script was very unpolished and it showed.

[Temujin]

3) science fiction scares the shit out of some people - like my mom, who was afraid of Star Trek and, if asked, would probably have dumped it into the "horror" category. Maybe it's because SF deviates from reality, makes you question your assumptions about the world, or just has funny-looking "deformed" people in it. It's not a mindset I, personally, understand (I started watching Star Trek at 5 or 6, and reading Arthur C. Clarke at 7 - once I discovered SF I couldn't get enough) but it's one I've encountered in people who say they hate SF. Poor mom - all of us four kids went through an SF period and a couple of us never "outgrew" it. Seriously, she'd get up an leave the room when Star Trek or Battlestar or Buck Rogers or Lost in Space was on, or whatever. Then I went and married someone so geeky he has actual props from the "Trouble with Tribbles" episode. (Me, when I see the episode and spot which bits of the bar we actually own I go squee!, but I think it's common knowledge I was a geek before it was fashionable)

This is a great point. Back in high school a friend of mine reacted with vehement psychotic hatred towards Star Trek. When I inquired as to why, it seemed that another friend of his was really into Trek and once brought up the concept of alternate universes and an alternate version of you. Needless to say my friend freaked out. While his explanation was incredibly incoherent with a lot of "it's stupid" and "it sucks" mixed in, it seems he just couldn't wrap his head around the idea and it completely boggled his mind. Now he wasn't stupid, but I got the impression that his inability to comprehend the idea made him feel dumb and thus he got defensive.

[Srelex]

That's very strange; I and most people I know were familiar with the idea of alternate universes from a young age. I mean, I'm certain the concept's cropped up in children's cartoons and other things besides Star Trek.

[Temujin]

Yeah, his response was quite bizarre, cause I knew he had been heavily into some stuff like GI Joe when he was younger (and IIRC, the cartoon actually had an alt universe episode).

[GrandMasterTerwynn]

As has been said, sci-fi with spaceships and explosions and whatnot requires a not-insignificant budget, fairly specialized writers, and appeals to a comparatively insignificant audience. Which is to say it's almost always a losing proposition on television. Hence the buyers-remorse network executives feel about five minutes before the pilot episode of a space opera show finishes airing, and their drive to kill the show before it runs long enough that the salaries of the actors grow enough to eat up what little money the show makes for the network. It's also why space opera shows tend to only pop up a few times a decade . . . long enough for the studio execs to have years of good VHS/DVD/Blu-Ray sales push away the memories of how poorly the show did in the ratings compared to whatever crime dramas/sitcoms/game shows it was competing against at the time. We're just in a comparative flat-spot between crops of space operas. Before you know it, there'll be another GRIMDARK in SPAAACE, BONANZA in SPAAACE, or sparkly VAMPIRES in SPAAACE, and the cycle will continue.

[Stofsk]

How much does a sci-fi show's budget compare with a typical run-of-the-mill tv show's budget? I mean it makes sense that sci-fi shows are rare because they might intuitively require more funding, but how accurate is that? Many sci-fi shows had a shoe-string budget.

I suspect this is more an excuse than a real reason, to be honest. Something tv suits say when they kill a sci-fi show off but then spend their money on some bullshit other show.

[Ghost Rider]

How much does a sci-fi show's budget compare with a typical run-of-the-mill tv show's budget? I mean it makes sense that sci-fi shows are rare because they might intuitively require more funding, but how accurate is that? Many sci-fi shows had a shoe-string budget.

How much is something I've seen a few charts and a few out of date, but it is something that creators and networks have noted. Take Star Trek. Even with all of Gene's yabbering and revision, it was noted to being one of the more expensive shows for Desilu. In fact TNG was noted to being expensive for simply the effects.

It is something to note a difference between most TV and science fiction in particular. Effects do cost extra and only a select few shows use it. Add that to everything else that TV shows have to do with actors and contracts I can see the ambivalence towards science fiction programs.

[GrandMasterTerwynn]

How much does a sci-fi show's budget compare with a typical run-of-the-mill tv show's budget? I mean it makes sense that sci-fi shows are rare because they might intuitively require more funding, but how accurate is that? Many sci-fi shows had a shoe-string budget.

Let me rephrase. The budget of a sci-fi show is hefty compared to the size of its expected audience. nBSG had a budget of something like $1.5 million per episode. Stargate: Atlantis had a budget of $1.7 million per episode. This compares to the $1.6 million per episode a CSI show costs. However, where Battlestar Galactica was lucky to get 3 million viewers per week, CSI pulls in over fifteen. What this means is that CBS can charge far more for a 30 second TV ad spot during CSI than SciFi could for a 30 second ad during nBSG, since the advertising during CSI could be expected to reach roughly five times the audience.

This is also why a show like American Idol, which is estimated to cost something like $0.8 million per episode and draws nearly twenty million viewers makes FOX money hand-over-fist.

[adam_grif]

I wonder if it would be possible to make a zero budget SciFi that was actually solid. A web series or something. There's no shortage of one or two man operations that involve a dude talking into a camera with the occasional (awful) special effects.

[Patrick Degan]

I think a lot of the anger with nuTrek was because it well, WAS nuTrek. It told a TOS story without the familiar depiction of the TOS setting, the familiar depiction of the TOS ships, the familiar depiction of the CHARACTERS...
For a fanbase that for damn near forty years has grown used to Shatner Kirk, Nimoy Spock, Kelly Bones and so on it's going to take a while for them to warm up to the NEW TOS even if the intro film had been brilliant (which it was anything but).

No, a lot of the anger at nuTrek comes from the fact that large chunks of the movie make no fucking sense and nuKirk comes off as an asshole and an idiot who was lucky he didn't get his fool head lopped off. I didn't mind the fact that there was a wholly new cast playing the characters. The originals are starting to die off so it was inevitable. Zachary Quinto made a rather decent Spock, for example. But the script was very flawed. Had the studio bothered to put forth a decent story and better characterisations, nuTrek would have come off as a much better film.

[Shroom Man 777]

I liked NuTrek a lot.

[Broomstick]

That's very strange; I and most people I know were familiar with the idea of alternate universes from a young age. I mean, I'm certain the concept's cropped up in children's cartoons and other things besides Star Trek.

Well, in my mom's case she predated TV so it may well have been that she had had no need to consider some common SF ideas and motifs until she in her 40's, and they freaked her out because they were so very different than the reality she knew. Younger folks... I don't know. There probably are more people than you realize who are old enough to drive and vote and legally buy a drink who actually haven't heard of those things because they were forbidden cartoons (we live in a world where the freakin' teletubbies are view as the homosexual minions of Satan by some people) and only watched mundane cop shows and reality shows growing up.

If you're a SF fan and a geek your world and their world probably don't intersect that much.

That's very strange; I and most people I know were familiar with the idea of alternate universes from a young age. I mean, I'm certain the concept's cropped up in children's cartoons and other things besides Star Trek.

I think the first two series for Red Dwarf comes closest to that idea. I have no idea what the budget was at that point, but the effects and sets were ludicrously cheap.

When it caught on their budget increased and so did the quality of some of the props and make-up, so later seasons where undoubtedly more expensive to produce.

I think a lot of the anger with nuTrek was because it well, WAS nuTrek. It told a TOS story without the familiar depiction of the TOS setting, the familiar depiction of the TOS ships, the familiar depiction of the CHARACTERS...
For a fanbase that for damn near forty years has grown used to Shatner Kirk, Nimoy Spock, Kelly Bones and so on it's going to take a while for them to warm up to the NEW TOS even if the intro film had been brilliant (which it was anything but).

No, a lot of the anger at nuTrek comes from the fact that large chunks of the movie make no fucking sense and nuKirk comes off as an asshole and an idiot who was lucky he didn't get his fool head lopped off.

You mean.... like old Kirk? I'm only kidding a little - in the old series Kirk could be an asshole, too. And let's not get started with how often he fucked over the Prime Directive...

I didn't mind the fact that there was a wholly new cast playing the characters. The originals are starting to die off so it was inevitable. Zachary Quinto made a rather decent Spock, for example. But the script was very flawed. Had the studio bothered to put forth a decent story and better characterisations, nuTrek would have come off as a much better film.

Given audience expectations, they can't cut money on the effects, the sets, or the make-up, so that leaves hiring relative unknowns and getting less than top shelf writers...

Parts of the movie/plot didn't make sense? Again - that's been a problem with Trek since the beginning. It's just that the the really shitty episodes from 1966 just aren't re-run as often as the favorites. The same applies to Next Generation - people tend to focus on the better episodes and not the suck ones, unless the whole point of what they're saying is to prove ST:TNG sucked or the whole franchise sucks. I don't care what television series you look at, most episodes are average, some are complete shit, and there are a few that are good standouts.

No, actually, I don't think NuTrek sucked. Batman might think it sucked, but that's strictly his opinion. Plotwise, it was way better than Avatar. The problem is that the Star Trek franchise is old. I don't think fans want a re-hash of it, no matter how good the actors, plot, or special effects might be (and admittedly while I don't think NuTrek sucked it wasn't stellar on any of those, either). Next Generation succeeded (despite a first season of suck) because it wasn't the same old characters.

I enjoyed NuTrek because I wasn't expecting it to be any better than the rest of Trek - at this point, doing anything novel in the franchise is damn near impossible anyhow.

[adam_grif]

Plotwise, it was way better than Avatar.

Woah, woah.

I know that this is subjective and all, but NuTrek didn't exactly have the greatest plot ever. It only makes any sense if you assume that Nero is completely insane. A star is going supernova, and threatens to wipe out the entire galaxy ( ) and then they want to make a black hole to suck it up. That's dumb but whatever.

Then, they fail to do this in time, Romulus blows up, and now a mining ship got sucked into a black hole (because that = time travel in this movie, again, whatever). Why didn't the supernova get sent back in time too? Whatever. Then, even though Spock was trying to help his people and just didn't get there in time, instead of actually going to the currently-perfectly-in-tact Romulus, warning them about it or something, he opts to wait around until Spock comes out of the black hole in a different location and time, and then... strand him on a planet. Fine, he's irrational and he hates Spock. WHATEVER.

THEN, by pure fucking coincidence, the moon that he's stranded on (Vulcan has no moons, but whatever), Kirk is also marooned on. And it turns out that this is all happening on the same planet where Scotty is, who just happened to be the future-inventor of the exact fucking thing they need to asspull their way back onto the Enterprise.

And now, despite his revenge being largely complete, having made Spock watch his planet get blown to shit, he now inexplicably wants to destroy the entire Federation. WHATEVER. The only reason this happens is so the plot can keep going, because "oh no they're going after Earth next" is like one of those standard push-button phrases that is supposed to illicit instant emotional reactions. Oh my god, that's where I live! Fuck!

Then during the fighting and shit, the ship gets sucked into a blackhole again, but this time doesn't get sent back in time for, you know, whatever reason. Because the mechanisms by which the black holes operate changes from scene to scene.

The plot is a total mess. Avatar isn't amazing but it's at least fairly solidly constructed.

[Patrick Degan]

You mean.... like old Kirk? I'm only kidding a little - in the old series Kirk could be an asshole, too. And let's not get started with how often he fucked over the Prime Directive...

There was a huge difference between TOS Kirk running roughshod over people to get to a definite objective (revealing an escaped war-criminal, forcing two warring planets to the peace table by holding a big gun to their heads, destroying a creature that nearly killed him and killed his captain and half the crew on the first starship he served on) and nuKirk reveling in being "the smartest repeat offender in Iowa" and managing to get to the captain's chair through sheer idiot luck and very retarded plot-convenience.

Given audience expectations, they can't cut money on the effects, the sets, or the make-up, so that leaves hiring relative unknowns and getting less than top shelf writers...

Doing a decent SF movie does not exactly require the most expensive, up to date state-of-the-art SFX or starship sets that look on one level like the Apple Store and on the other like Schotz Brewery, just something that looks decent on screen and believable.

Parts of the movie/plot didn't make sense? Again - that's been a problem with Trek since the beginning. It's just that the the really shitty episodes from 1966 just aren't re-run as often as the favorites. The same applies to Next Generation - people tend to focus on the better episodes and not the suck ones, unless the whole point of what they're saying is to prove ST:TNG sucked or the whole franchise sucks. I don't care what television series you look at, most episodes are average, some are complete shit, and there are a few that are good standouts.

If you took away all the ridiculous coincidences on which the plot of that movie was based, you wouldn't have had a plot. Furthermore, the motivations of Nero could only make sense, as adam_grif has suggested, to someone who was completely insane.

No, actually, I don't think NuTrek sucked. Batman might think it sucked, but that's strictly his opinion. Plotwise, it was way better than Avatar. The problem is that the Star Trek franchise is old. I don't think fans want a re-hash of it, no matter how good the actors, plot, or special effects might be (and admittedly while I don't think NuTrek sucked it wasn't stellar on any of those, either). Next Generation succeeded (despite a first season of suck) because it wasn't the same old characters.

Nobody is talking about doing a "rehash". They're talking about doing something that was better than the movie we got.

I enjoyed NuTrek because I wasn't expecting it to be any better than the rest of Trek - at this point, doing anything novel in the franchise is damn near impossible anyhow.

Perhaps novelty is not realistically to be expected out of Star Trek anymore. But the franchise turning out a watchable film that doesn't insult one's intelligence at the most basic level would make for a nice change of pace.

[Broomstick]

Plotwise, it was way better than Avatar.

Woah, woah.

I know that this is subjective and all, but NuTrek didn't exactly have the greatest plot ever.

I in no way dispute that. The NuTrek plot was mediocre at best, and I believe I mention and/or imply there are issues with it.

And yes, it's subjective, but I think the plot of NuTrek is superior to the plot of Avatar. By the way, I did enjoy Avatar - but it wasn't because of the plot.

It only makes any sense if you assume that Nero is completely insane.

Why is that an issue? Let's review some of ST:TOS:

- NAZIS IN SPAAAAAAAAAAAACE! Yes, there really was such an episode. I try hard not to remember it. In fact, I try so hard I can't remember the name of the damn episode at the moment, which happens to be 3 am (you know, a time my memory isn't at peak).

- CHICAGO GANGSTERS IN SPAAAAAAAAAAAAAAACE! - "A Piece of the Action".

- AMERICAN INDIANS IN SPAAAAAAAAAACE! - can't remember the fucking name of that episode, either.

- THE GREEK GOD APOLLO IN SPAAAAAAAACE! - "Who Mourns for Adonis"

- ROMANS IN... wait, they weren't in space, but anyhow, 20th Century sort of Ancient Romans in "Bread and Circuses"

Look, fucking stupid plots is nothing in Star Trek. As is time travel as a plot device, either pseudo-time travel like the above or "real" time travel as in "Assignment Earth", "All Our Yesterdays", and a couple others.

Of course, like I said, people try to forget those episodes and fondling recall things like the Horta, which was a really well done truly alien alien (no funny nose and forehead ridges of the week there) or "Journey to Babel" or "City on the Edge of Forever" which, although a time travel story, is not as retarded as most.

So yeah, insane bad guy does batshit crazy, nonsensical thing which is remedied by technobabble technobabble technobabble is par for the course. As I said, I wasn't expecting this to be anything other than Star Trek. That's typical of the franchise as a whole.

THEN, by pure fucking coincidence, the moon that he's stranded on (Vulcan has no moons, but whatever),

[nitpick]Due to continuity errors (which apparently are inevitable in a franchise that extends over several decades) Vulcan is either moonless OR a double planet, having a companion world and the two orbit around a common center of gravity OR other planets in the Vulcan system are really close to Vulcan.

Other than that, yes, your criticism is not entirely off-base, however, it's no worse than the average Trek episode and, since my yardstick for the judging said movie was calibrated in accordance with 40+ years of ST watching I was, as I said, not disappointed.[/nitpick]

[Broomstick]

Given audience expectations, they can't cut money on the effects, the sets, or the make-up, so that leaves hiring relative unknowns and getting less than top shelf writers...

Doing a decent SF movie does not exactly require the most expensive, up to date state-of-the-art SFX or starship sets that look on one level like the Apple Store and on the other like Schotz Brewery, just something that looks decent on screen and believable.

You think so and I think so and I think Roddenberry thought so but Roddenberry is dead and Paramount is running the show now. It's under corporate control, which means eye candy comes before hiring a real science fiction writer. And I think that's a key factor - the better shows in ST:TOS were written by science fiction writers, not Hollywood hacks who write whatever genre they're assigned this week.

If you took away all the ridiculous coincidences on which the plot of that movie was based, you wouldn't have had a plot. Furthermore, the motivations of Nero could only make sense, as adam_grif has suggested, to someone who was completely insane.

I thought that WAS part of the deal, the idea that Nero WAS insane.

Nobody is talking about doing a "rehash". They're talking about doing something that was better than the movie we got.

"Reboot" means recycling the old characters. It worked for NuBSG, in part because they reworked the characters drastically so it really was an entirely new group with familiar names and a somewhat similar setting. Not sure that would have worked for ST. Or they could have gone for really making NuTrek a prequel to ST:TOS and not a reboot. In my mind it's like they were afraid to push it enough to really be a refreshing reboot.

I enjoyed NuTrek because I wasn't expecting it to be any better than the rest of Trek - at this point, doing anything novel in the franchise is damn near impossible anyhow.

Perhaps novelty is not realistically to be expected out of Star Trek anymore. But the franchise turning out a watchable film that doesn't insult one's intelligence at the most basic level would make for a nice change of pace.

ST has had "pretty fucking insulting at a basic level" crop up from time to time since the first season.

Really, ST works best on TV. The record for the feature-length films is spotty (only half of them worth watching, at best). It's getting to be like James Bond - seriously, how many of those can you watch?

[Patrick Degan]

Doing a decent SF movie does not exactly require the most expensive, up to date state-of-the-art SFX or starship sets that look on one level like the Apple Store and on the other like Schotz Brewery, just something that looks decent on screen and believable.

You think so and I think so and I think Roddenberry thought so but Roddenberry is dead and Paramount is running the show now. It's under corporate control, which means eye candy comes before hiring a real science fiction writer. And I think that's a key factor - the better shows in ST:TOS were written by science fiction writers, not Hollywood hacks who write whatever genre they're assigned this week.

I know. It all comes down to making accountants understand this.

If you took away all the ridiculous coincidences on which the plot of that movie was based, you wouldn't have had a plot. Furthermore, the motivations of Nero could only make sense, as adam_grif has suggested, to someone who was completely insane.

I thought that WAS part of the deal, the idea that Nero WAS insane.

Even if you're writing about an insane character, his twisted schemings have to make some sort of sense for the reader/viewer. This is a requirement of fiction in order for it to be entertaining, paradoxically for it to be more realistic than reality (perhaps a corollary to aspects of reality which are sometimes stranger than fiction).

Nobody is talking about doing a "rehash". They're talking about doing something that was better than the movie we got.

"Reboot" means recycling the old characters. It worked for NuBSG, in part because they reworked the characters drastically so it really was an entirely new group with familiar names and a somewhat similar setting. Not sure that would have worked for ST. Or they could have gone for really making NuTrek a prequel to ST:TOS and not a reboot. In my mind it's like they were afraid to push it enough to really be a refreshing reboot.

At least it might have been a better effort.

Perhaps novelty is not realistically to be expected out of Star Trek anymore. But the franchise turning out a watchable film that doesn't insult one's intelligence at the most basic level would make for a nice change of pace.

ST has had "pretty fucking insulting at a basic level" crop up from time to time since the first season.

Not compared to this movie. This movie collapses utterly if you remove it's twists into pure plot-convenience theatre and Nero's motivations have no definable logic at all.

[Thanas]

Sorry Broomstick, but you do not get to simply write off glaring, obvious flaws in the story logic with "but TOS did it too".

[LionElJonson]

Huh? Nero's motivations made perfect sense to me. He wanted revenge for the death of his world and his family at the hands of the Federation. So, first he blows up Vulcan, and then he goes off to blow up Earth, since it's one of the most important planets in the Federation.

[Sarevok]

Sorry Broomstick, but you do not get to simply write off glaring, obvious flaws in the story logic with "but TOS did it too".

Well I never watched much TOS anyway. So nuTrek was just another movie to me. And as a movie it was very dull and uninteresting. nuTrek is one of the very few big budget action films I fell asleep watching. The fact nuTrek needs old Trek to prop it up is an argument in favor of its weakness a stand alone film.

[Marcus Aurelius]

Plotwise, it was way better than Avatar.

Woah, woah.

I know that this is subjective and all, but NuTrek didn't exactly have the greatest plot ever.

I in no way dispute that. The NuTrek plot was mediocre at best, and I believe I mention and/or imply there are issues with it.

And yes, it's subjective, but I think the plot of NuTrek is superior to the plot of Avatar. By the way, I did enjoy Avatar - but it wasn't because of the plot.

I think it comes down to what your priorities are. Most people here are logically minded, so the huge plot holes in nuTrek that are big enough for a General Systems Vehicle to fly through are more bothersome to them than the fact that the plot of Avatar is basically a sugar-coated remake of A Man Called Horse (not Pocahontas, only ignorant people suggest that) which, unlike the original, idealizes the natives, adds a little bit of kindergarten level ecological message and puts a huge battle to the end of the movie in order to placate friends of action. In short, Avatar is a stream of loans and clichés designed for the lowest common denominator that makes many if not most other big budget Hollywood movies look like unique, challenging and original works of fiction, a pretty tall order I might add. But yeah, it was pretty.

For the record: I liked both about equally, although Avatar is certainly a much more important film for the development of big screen science fiction and the movie industry in general. Both are single-use mindless entertainment, although I do want to see the 2D version of Avatar when I don't have anything better to watch.

[Broomstick]

Sorry Broomstick, but you do not get to simply write off glaring, obvious flaws in the story logic with "but TOS did it too".

You're overlooking the very simple explanation that I am easily amused.

Hey, if it doesn't work for you it doesn't work for you. Yes, there are glaring plotholes. However, this clearly bothers other people more than it bother me.

[Aaron]

I wonder if it would be possible to make a zero budget SciFi that was actually solid. A web series or something. There's no shortage of one or two man operations that involve a dude talking into a camera with the occasional (awful) special effects.

Red Dwarf was fairly successful with crap effects, it was a comedy however.

[Broomstick]

Dr. Horrible's Sing-a-Long Blog might also qualify - but again, it was a comedy.

[Sarevok]

Hobbyists goofing around the internet have produced great lightsaber fight scenes, space battle sequences, master chief running around.... etc. This is not 80s anymore. Anyone with a computer and dedication can create some amazing scenes that took armies of people people in past.

Why is it still so expensive to create special effects for scifi tv show ?