(SCI-FI.RAR !!!) Create a Sci-Fi series

[Rabid]

I keep hearing on this board that sci-fi, good sci-fi (not sharktopus z-movies), is dead on TV, that there's practically no chance we'll ever see again a good original series that isn't going to be scrapped before the end of Season 1 or something like that.

So here is a challenge :

Generic Television Network Inc. wants you to create a new Sci-Fi series. They want something at the same time appealing to “classical” sci-fi fans (a.k.a. Neeeeerds) while also appealing to a larger audience not expected to be familiar with most of the science-fiction genre, outside the Star Wars movies or Mr. Spock.

Here are the constraints :

- Your contract demand for one (1) season of twelve (12) episodes fifty (50) minutes longs, which have to include two (2) commercial breaks. If, and only if the ratings are judged sufficient (judgement left to the network's executives), a second season will be approved => the series' plot (if there is any) has to be resolved in one season, while leaving the potential for a sequel.

- You will have a total budget of $20 millions, which can be extended to $25 millions, ONLY if the reviewing committee from the network judge the series has enough potential to warrant budget extension (=> don't count on it)

- There are no constraint of genre : it can be a slice of life comedy show as it can be an epic tale of courage and bravery, a space western or a deep introspective social commentary about the change to society transhumanism might bring... You can even blend as many genre as you want, or it can even be a sketch based show, with a different genre and tone for each “sketch”. The only real constraint is that the Network has to be able to broadcast it to a large audience in prime-time (no naughty sex or things that could upset the announcers or the censors).

- The whole series will be shot before the first airing. You have 18 months from now to develop your idea, put a crew together, and get this shit real and broadcast-ready.

- Everything has to be original, unless you can manage to buy the rights/a licence for something with your $20 million budget. But be aware that the money you'll use to buy a license will be money you'll not use to pay good actors and film quality Sci-Fi.

- This whole thing is a gamble made by the Direction to gain more market-shares than they have already, and it is done on surplus funds after a particularly good year. You'll only have one shot at it : if the first season isn't a commercial success, your series is dead, and you're due to find a new job.

- Note : you can hire as many actors as you want, or as famous as you want, as long as everything stays inside the budget's constraints. The Network strongly recommend you try hiring new and promising actors : they are cheaper, and the networks will have bragging rights if they manage to become famous because of your show.




So... What are your ideas ? First, what kind of series would you make ? And secondly, how would you make it ?

[Rabid]

Ghetto edit :

I forgot to say that, if you manage to convince the network executives that your project will manage to get past the so-called "animation age ghetto", you can ever do the whole series (or part of it) animated, which can allow you to do things like space opera without worrying too much about special effects.

[Number Theoretic]

What i would make: I would choose the following setting:
Some interesting real solar system, that has a decent amount of gas giants and a Kuiper belt or (even better) a protoplanetary disc in it and is at most 100 light years away from Earth. Date would be approximately 2800-3200 A.D.
One Europa-style icy moon and one desert-like moon, where the temperatures are barely ok for humans, but oxygen masks are necessary. And lots of space habitats, of any kind, although the budget would constrain the plot to take place on only a few locations. Background history: one strong faction/nation in the system strongly embraces mental unification of humans and AIs, while the rest of the nations/factions in the solar system strongly oppose that idea. A few stay neutral, but most are in a Coalition against the machine unification people. Tensions rise and the system is on the verge of war (which breaks out at the end of the first season).
I haven't worked out the characters so far, but a loose idea would be, that one or two arrivein the system on an interstellar trade ship, while the others (2 or 3, if the network desires a classic Five-Man-Band) are locals. They would meet rather randomly (for example in a bar, where they get into the classic pub brawl). During the series, they get between the frontiers of the conflict between the machine unification people and their enemys and at the end, they have the opportunity to flee on another interstellar trade ship, when the war begins and the system sinks into chaos. They have to decide if they want to flee or to stay.
Technology is advanced, but i would do it a "hard" as possible: therefore no FTL, 3D space, no space friction, believable starships and space battles and Used Future. To sum it up: Technological wonders along extremly run-down, fucked up machinery which is just barely held together with duct tape.

tl; dr: A space opera, combined with hard SF, (hopefully ) charakter development and action on occasion

How would i make it:
Since the above setting demands much effort to put into background story, research, effects, sets and requisites, i would hire unknown, but promising actors. Perhaps it is
only doable, when done animated. Even with some real settings, it would require much CGI. But i'm not in the TV business, so it's hard for me to judge, if it would be possible to fit my idea into a $20 millon budget. If there is a chance that it would: awesome! if not, i need a new idea

[Rabid]

^Possible plot-hole that demand an explanation :

The two foreigners, that come from another star-system, in a setting without FTL... Why did they come here in the first place ? Are they some sort of diplomats, or security agents from the Trade Union of Terran Colonies sent because their boss heard about the war brewing-on and needed boots on the ground to write him a report on the situation or something like that ?

Also, "dumb" question, but if you want to make your sci-fi look hard, you'll have to be able to answer it : what are you trade ships trading at STL speed between star systems (something that require an awful lot of energy to achieve in less than a decade) ? Apart from people, I mean ? And how does the important lag time in the trade flow is handled ? Etc... In short, what is the justification for STL travel between star systems to be a "normal" occurence, and not just restricted to Colony Ships ?


... Or is it that this system is a newly colonized one, established less than two centuries ago, and it still receive material aide from its neighbours in order to fully develop and become independent ? If so, are its neighbours giving this aid freely, or do they expect something in return ? If so what ? Etc...

[Number Theoretic]

Other possible backgrounds than diplomats could be: fugitive from some other system that went foul, a rich selfmademan or self-declared historian or scientist who just likes to explore the galaxy and can actually afford interstellar journeys (or at least one) or one of the characters is a former crew member of one of those trade ships, who just gets dumped. "Mixed up" colonist may also be an idea.

Most likely, interstellar trade will be run by family clans or corporations, who are able to think in very long time frames. Like you suggested, they could offer to transport people between the stars, but i don't think that you could earn much from that. Transporting luxury goods or art that is unique to some solar systems might be a market as well as transporting various forms of unobtanium, like meta-materials, anti-matter or really advanced technology of any kind. Detailed recordings of various historic events in some systems might also be of interest in other systems, but that depends highly on culture.
They would almost always be interested in trading their offers for energy and perhaps some supplies or anything that could be traded somewhere else.
And, because entering interstellar trade is expensive, there wouldn't be too many of them around.

edit: "Normal" might be a matter of definition in interstellar time frames. Systems on a "busy" trade route might see only one interstellar trader every 20 years or so.

[Netko]

...

Total Recall, the series, is pretty much nearly spot on for what you're proposing. It tanked, even though it was pretty decent.

[Zixinus]

Before I have a few questions:

In which country/region would the studio be in? Because it matters for locations (ie, are we stuck in Cardiff?).

What assets does the TV station have? Can we re-use props, locations, in-house animations (and their experience) studios, stock footage, etc?

Because using stock footage can be helpful.

- You will have a total budget of $20 millions, which can be extended to $25 millions, ONLY if the reviewing committee from the network judge the series has enough potential to warrant budget extension (=> don't count on it)

Can we get a rough idea how much this or that costs? Because I have no idea.

Can you give rough guesses? Like "5 minutes CGI on a barren alien world= 5000$" or something?

[FaxModem1]

Treasure World.

Opening intro(if they still do those)
In an alternate world, where zeppelins and small planes are the fastest form of transportation around, where the rich are rich and the poor are poor, and there's no in-between, a world where there are various nations fighting over the skies, pirates, travelers, and monsters hunt for the great treasure of the legendary Captain Roberts.

Its a different world, much like our 1930s and 1940s, with Victorian and Edwardian fashions in technology and clothing still existing. Its quickly established that there are two classes of people, the rich and the poor. Those who own everything, and those who don't. Our heroes are a zeppelin crew who mostly cater to the rich passengers on board, until one day a rather eccentric old man dies in his cabin and parts of a map on his table. After docking at a nearby skyscraper, the crew find out that the man who died was Captain Roberts, one of the last great sea pirates. Word eventually gets around the ship, and soon the whole crew and passengers want the map and get the treasure.

So we have rich Great White Hunters from the passengers who commission the vessel, cutthroat loan sharks who hear of the map through someone owing money, and all sorts of parties hunting for the pieces of the map and the location of the treasure.

A weekly treasure hunt show, we have the era of nautical adventure in the time of the pulp action 1930s.

How would I do it:
Film in Prague, its cheap there for all the locations of that era of buildings and use sets for the zeppelins. For plane dogfights and zeppelin ship to ship battles, use CGI, but only save it for the pilot, the finale, and halfway through, this is mostly a ground show.

[Rabid]

In which country/region would the studio be in? Because it matters for locations (ie, are we stuck in Cardiff?).

Well, you can either go American Network, and so you'll work with Vancouver/Toronto/Seattle/California/Generic East Coast Setting ; Or you can go BBC/Big European Network (Canal+ ?) and use European locations (which ones in particular, I don't really know).

What assets does the TV station have? Can we re-use props, locations, in-house animations (and their experience) studios, stock footage, etc?

It's a big national television network which continually produce/is sponsoring the production of new shows. You can relatively easily reuse assets from previous productions if you are inventive.

Can we get a rough idea how much this or that costs? Because I have no idea.

Can you give rough guesses? Like "5 minutes CGI on a barren alien world= 5000$" or something?

Well, I don't really know, but you can estimate that the average salary of the people working on the show is two to six times the minimum wages of the country, averaging for all personnel involved, including the actors.

[mr friendly guy]

According to wiki in regards to Stargate

Stargate SG-1 was filmed in and around Vancouver, British Columbia, mainly at The Bridge Studios and NORCO Studios,[28][29] which offered Stargate SG-1 tax breaks throughout its run.[24] The cost of an SG-1 episode increased from US$1.3 million[30] in the first seasons to an estimated US$2 million per episode in season 10, partly due to unfavorable exchange rates

So presumably with a $20 million budget over 12 episodes, we get around $1.66 million per episode. So I guess we can expect an episode to have the equivalent of Stargate.

With a bit of further googling

I have seen claims that Doctor Who cost £10 million per season, not counting Christmas specials, so around £770,000 per episode.

So with the budget alloted by the OP, I imagine we would be able to easily film a Doctor Who or Stargate equivalent with special effects. The problem is with the weaker American dollar, it might blow out our budget.

[Zixinus]

Title: "Destination: Barren Earth"

Alternative titles:
- "Barren Earth"
- "Voyage's end"
- "Chared home"

Story synopsis: After arriving home in decades of a centuries-long journey, explorer astronauts find their home barren and almost devoid of human life. Limited on supplies, they must re-explore Earth and find clues as to the mysterious disappearance to the most of humanity.

Primary characters:
- Mission commander
- Secondary commander
- Spacecraft chief engineer
- Alpha team captain
- Beta team captain
- Research head
Plus various other characters depending on how and who is needed.

[sirocco]

Preliminary Title: "New Home"

Story synopsis:

End of the 22nd century. The first extrasolar habitable planet has been found. It has a biosphere able to support Earth-like life.

The solar system just got out of the first space crisis of its history. The 2 main factions of the human sphere are the Earth Federation which has taken the mantle of the UN and the Free Colonies of Centauri, which seceded from the solar system since the middle of the 22nd century. They both want to settle on this new world, code name "Renaissance".

Centauri got initially populated through a natural stable wormhole appearing at the outer edge of the solar system. Their civilization is based on space habitats and mobile space stations deployed around the main bodies of Alpha and Beta Centauri. However they are severely constrained by their technology and have therefore a very low and fragile demographic growth. Renaissance would enable them to finally be on par with the Earth Federation.

The latter is still a young organization still struggling with remnants from the former nations from Earth and the last political and economic crisis. However they do fear the rapid growth of the Centauri and even more if they managed to set foot on Renaissance. They need also to reestablish their prominent position as the center of the human sphere. Renaissance would be a good occasion to do so.

Pilot will focus on the selection of the Earth crew and end with the arrival on Renaissance and the first confrontation with the Centauri crew. First season will be about the competition between both civilization, their common struggle against Renaissance environment, how they deal with day-to-day problems while still needing to follow the requirements of their individual mission.

[Zixinus]

Further elaboration of "Destination: Barren Earth" idea.
Note, that it contains some of my confusion on the time dilation in relativity.

The story is that of returning astronauts from Alpha century, where strange and alien life was discovered. Eventually robotic exploration was not enough so a manned mission was sent out. However, the price was high: due to time dilation they would spend only a few years in space while they've been gone from Earth for centuries.

When they return and go trough a complex de-acceleration manoeuvre with Jupiter (then Mars and Earth), they find that there appears to be no artificial signals of any kind, nevermind a welcoming community. When they arrive on Earth, they find that not only has natural disasters and pollution has rendered certain areas unhabitable, they find little to no sign of human civilization.

At first, there is a manic rush with various communications equipment and the stating of the fact that the crew has to leave the ship soon. The spaceship is low on supplies, including propellant and it has to be relieved as much as possible mass as possible or it will decay orbit (they had to use atmosphere-braking just to get stable orbit around Earth). It was expected that some other vessel would resupply in an earlier point. The ship remains in orbit for a while longer (after dumping various things that was not meant to be simply dumped), with a skeleton crew.

Thus the crew makes the hasty decision to land in what appears to be a ruined city, where the show slowly starts to explore both the daily struggles of just trying to stay alive and discover what the hell happened to everybody.

Further compounded is the problem of Alpha Centuri life samples that had to be brought with them and one of them escaping (a plant). The life itself is mysterious, the explorers hoping to learn more when actually home.

The pilot would end with the ship receiving a transmission dedicated to them. It shows that is obviously sick with radiation sickness and explaining that everything has gone to shit. Several wars have broken out and there are confirmed reports of alien activity. At no point is the obvious radiation sickness addressed, as well as the man speaking with a strange accent, as if he studied it from a book. The transmission video contains relatively few details as to what actually happened, but more like expressions on hope and thanks on the great mission they have done.