Star Trek is now at its lowest point since the cancellation of the Original Series
O Deus
Original Series. In some ways Star Trek is even worse off today since
it has a fraction of the fanbase Star Trek had back then still left.
Two years ago there were two great white hopes that were going to save
the franchise, Enterprise and Nemesis. Both have failed. Enterprise is
not gaining viewers but losing them, it's staying alive but it isn't
doing anything besides surviving. Nemesis was a disaster of collosal
proportions that will likely bury the film end of the franchise for
the forseeable future, if not forever.
Both of these disasters had creative and marketing components.
Enterprise kicked off after two Star Trek series that alienated most
Star Trek fans and left a shrinking demographic as well as a
perception that the franchise was just a money machine cranking out
low quality material with the brand name on them.
By the time Enterprise came around the pilot's ratings tesify that a
lot fewer people and critics were willing to give it a chanche. Where
during the TOS era, Star Trek had the aura of a daring and promising
show cancelled before its time, by the time Enterprise premiered the
situation had long since reversed itself and now had the aura of a
soulless franchise that nobody but geeks and nerds still liked and
that should have been put to sleep years ago. Star Trek has
accumulated a lot of ill will over the years from SciFi fans from its
own fans and from mainstream viewers. Enterprise's shaky first season
and lack of engrossing material has not helped either. Now Enterprise
is yet another dwindling SciFi series dismissed by everyone and
propping up a shaky network which itself exists only through corporate
stupidity. In other words Enterprise has gone where DS9 and Voyager
have already been. Not only has Enterprise not revived Star Trek, but
it's yet another nail in the coffin of its decline.
Nemesis did have quality problems, mainly due to footage being cut in
a way that damaged the movie's ability to tell the story, nevertheless
it was and is the best TNG film ever made. It is also the last because
it should have been the first. It should have been the movie that
energized the transition of the TNG franchise to the big screen.
Instead the franchise went with a disastrous attempt to have Kirk hand
over the baton. The next two movies were just as bad in terms of
quality, they had promising elements but they were amateurishly
scripted, amateurishly directed and were more TV productions, than
film productions. And by the time Nemesis was announced, Star Trek
films had come to be viewed the same way that Star Trek TV series had
come to be viewed, as soulless cash cows for a franchise that had gone
on too long.
Paramount misread the situation disastrously when the quality of the
movie and the positive test screening responses led them to schedule
it as their high profile December release where tough competition
prevented it from gaining the publicity and the screens it needed
while gaining the ire of overworked critics trying to protect their
favorite films like Two Towers and Gangs of New York from competition
and regurgitating the popular view of the franchise by critically
savaging Nemesis. And released a mere 5 days before the 800 pound
gorilla that is the Peter Jackson version of LOTR, it was demographic
suicide. Since studio executives rarely take responsibility for their
stupid decisions, Nemesis and Star Trek itself will likely be blamed
instead. And that will almost certainly end the film franchise unless
they actually recognize that the problem with Nemesis was not a
creative failure, as a scheduling failure. But that's not likely,
nevertheless official Paramount statements on Nemesis should be
watched carefully for indications of the party line the studio will
take.
But with Nemesis bombing and Enterprise dying the same slow death as
every Berman created series, Star Trek is now in real trouble. It has
lost its film franchise and its grip on the TV franchise is only as
secure as its sinking ratings and Paramount's continuing commitment to
UPN. Neither is all that stable and all that certain 5 years from now.
That leaves us right back where the franchise was between TOS's
cancellation and STTMP's premiere, with Star Trek novels which seem to
be the only part of the franchise doing really well, with Star Trek
fandom itself and the fan collaborations, artwork, fanfic,
conventions, discussions and activity that kept Star Trek alive
originally.
Obviously Star Trek's fandom has shrunk and much of the more committed
fanbase is aging. By the time Enterprise goes off the air, they will
be increasingly less of a factor in any calculations. And in a
franchise whose younger audience has become increasingly disconnected
from the franchise's roots and now increasingly consists of fragmented
fanbases for the different spinoffs, keeping Star Trek alive will be
more difficult. Star Trek's active fanbase has shrunk. There are much
fewer people who have seen the latest series and many don't even think
that Star Trek should survive or that there is any point to keeping it
alive.
Many are pinning their hopes on a revitalization of Star Trek. Some
are calling for the removal of Rick Berman, but there is no real
reason to believe that this would improve things. Rick Berman may
indeed move on if he takes the fall for Nemesis and Enterprise, but
statistically speaking, his replacement is likely to be worse, not
better. And in any case revitalizing Star Trek may at this point be
near impossible as the case of Nemesis showed. Star Trek has a bad
reputation, it can't be changed now by simply putting a good product
out there because neither viewers nor critics will give it a chanche.
Even were a talented showrunner placed in charge of Enterprise today
and the show became one of the best series on television, most scifi
fans, let alone critics and mainstream viewers would continue to
ignore it or comment on repeat all the usual cliches about the
franchise.
Still others have proposed taking Star Trek off the air for a while to
build interest again, but in Hollywood that makes something an
irrelevant property. Star Trek today exists for two reasons, because
it's a franchise that Viacom can market and exploit in different ways
and because it props up UPN. If UPN goes and Star Trek has been gone
from the air for half a decade or so, it will never come back on the
air because attention will have shifted to other properties and Star
Trek will not be revived simply to prop up the merchandising licenses.
So what is to be done? Not much. Star Trek will still remain on TV
through some lucky factors. Star Trek fandom will maintain some of the
franchise's presence and merchandising sales. Beyond that, all good
things must end. TV shows don't last forever. There was a time when
Star Trek seemed like it might be special, like it might be the
exception. That time is past. Star Trek in its various incarnations
has gone on longer and done more than any other SF show out there. Its
best stuff has sunk into popular culture, it has inspired kids to
become scientists and astronauts. It's become a part of history. But
history is the record of things past and keeping Star Trek alive may
now have become impossible. Ultimately Kirk had to face his own
mortality and the time to do so the same may have come for Star Trek
itself.
Of course things seemed pretty hopeless back when Star Trek was first
cancelled. There were three networks and Star Trek was an expensive
show to do. The actors, the writers and the producers went on their
way to other jobs sure that the whole thing was over. It wasn't though
but the set of events that brought Star Trek back on the air were not
predictable back then and the set of events that might revive Star
Trek may not be predictable now. For now Star Trek is still hanging on
and who knows what tommorow will still bring. It might take careful
watching to spot the Vulcan mind meld and Genesis plot devices that
can create life from lifelessness and cheat death one more time.
Gisele La Roche
@posting.google.com:
> Star Trek is now at its lowest point
And a Merry Christmas to you too.............<sigh>
Gisele
John McCann
Completely agreed on all points. I guess "All Good Things..."
Larree McLaine
"O Deus" <od...@bigfoot.com> a écrit dans le message de news:
c6784f8f.02122...@posting.google.com...
> Star Trek is now at its lowest point since the cancellation of the
> Original Series.
<PLONK!>
Black Arachnia
Black Arachnia
CieJe
"Larree McLaine" <larree...@hotmail.com> wrote in message
news:C1UN9.29597$5B.2...@weber.videotron.net...
plonk? There's lots of good points and observations; this isn't like a troll
or anything.
CieJe
B.J. Hunter
time/storyline. . .
"O Deus" <od...@bigfoot.com> wrote in message
news:c6784f8f.02122...@posting.google.com...
Bob Gassel
time/storyline. . >>
That's ridiculous...if it's a good show, people will watch regardless of how it
fits or doesn't fit in the Trek timeline. Did people stay away from "The Voyage
Home" due of all the holes in the time-travel premise? Is "Relics" now a bad
episode because (as we learn in "Generations") Scotty should have known that
Kirk was gone and couldn't have saved him? Did "Wrath of Kahn" flop because
Chekov wasn't on the Enterprise in "Space Seed"?
BG
Detlef Kurtz
"Bob Gassel" <dir...@aol.com> schrieb im Newsbeitrag
news:20021224091950...@mb-md.aol.com...
> << The reason Enterprise is failing is because it is not true to the Trek
> time/storyline. . >>
>
> episode because (as we learn in "Generations") Scotty should have known
that
> Kirk was gone and couldn't have saved him? Did "Wrath of Kahn" flop
because
> Chekov wasn't on the Enterprise in "Space Seed"?
>
That explanation is simple!!! He just forgotten that Kirk is dead....the man
is ooold ;-)
DDK
David E. Powell
news:aua9bc$a6v$01$1...@news.t-online.com...
Well, most people devoted enough to know the timelines will be devoted
enough to know that the episode was made before the movie "Generations" was.
As for more casual viewers, they are more likely to watch an ep on TV than a
movie I guess.. or something ;)
IIRC, the movie was supposed to have Spock and Bones in it, and ended up
with Scotty & Co. after some stuff happened in preproduction.
DEP
Ralph
idg
snipped
> Both of these disasters had creative and marketing components.
> Enterprise kicked off after two Star Trek series that alienated most
> Star Trek fans and left a shrinking demographic as well as a
> perception that the franchise was just a money machine cranking out
> low quality material with the brand name on them.
...
I strongly disagree. DS9, unlike Voyager, was NOT "low quality
material". it was creative and innovative. even mythic in its
proportions. there were episodes that brought the best of literature
to mind and touched your heart. and no, it wasn't just a rip off of
B5. what DS9 suffered from was bad timing, worse slotting and the
worst ever advertising on ANY Trek output, released as it was to the
vagaries of UPN's "poor relative" fare, just one year after Voyager
was on. I'll NEVER understand why.
really, have you ever WATCHED DS9?! or were you just using it to prove
your points above? I seriously doubt whether you watched it all along,
because then you would have been more informed wrt to this part of
your essay. and if you did and you still believe what you wrote, well
then, we'll just have to agree to disagree.
indrani.
Dsybok
Everything you said I agree 100%.
D
jsa...@ecn.ab.ca
: really, have you ever WATCHED DS9?! or were you just using it to prove
: your points above?
Actually, you're both right.
Deep Space Nine was a series that had many quality episodes, and one that
was worthy of being taken seriously.
It was also a series that alienated many Star Trek fans, though, because
too often it was just plain *boring*.
John Savard
O Deus
> od...@bigfoot.com (O Deus) wrote in message news:<c6784f8f.02122...@posting.google.com>...
>
> snipped
> > Both of these disasters had creative and marketing components.
> > Enterprise kicked off after two Star Trek series that alienated most
> > Star Trek fans and left a shrinking demographic as well as a
> > perception that the franchise was just a money machine cranking out
> > low quality material with the brand name on them.
> ...
> really, have you ever WATCHED DS9?! or were you just using it to prove
> your points above? I seriously doubt whether you watched it all along,
> because then you would have been more informed wrt to this part of
> your essay. and if you did and you still believe what you wrote, well
> then, we'll just have to agree to disagree.
Note that I said 'perception' which undeniably does exist. The ratings
for DS9 also bear out the rather clear fact that it alienated most
fans and viewers year in and year out. DS9's quality and flaws are a
topic of discussion for another time entirely. And yes I did watch the
entire series, from the Leprechaun on the bridge to the red contact
lens demons trying to open the gateway to Bajoran hell and there is no
denying that DS9 had some serious lapses in quality and content.
Jonathan Archer
> Original Series. In some ways Star Trek is even worse off today since
> it has a fraction of the fanbase Star Trek had back then still left.
>
> Nemesis was a disaster of collosal proportions that will likely bury the film
> end of the franchise for the forseeable future, if not forever.
Ah SHADDUP
what sort of Star Trek fan are you anyway
O Deus
> od...@bigfoot.com (O Deus) wrote in message news:<c6784f8f.02122...@posting.google.com>...
> > Star Trek is now at its lowest point since the cancellation of the
> > Original Series. In some ways Star Trek is even worse off today since
> > it has a fraction of the fanbase Star Trek had back then still left.
> >
> YOU........YOU.............FLUCKWIT!!!! HOW DARE YOU!!!
How dare I what? Point out the fact that Ds9, Voyager and ENT are
pulling in a fraction of the ratings of TOS and TNG and command a
fraction of the fanbase. Well don't shoot the messenger, it doesn't
change the facts.
> > Nemesis was a disaster of collosal proportions that will likely bury the film
> > end of the franchise for the forseeable future, if not forever.
> Ah SHADDUP
> what sort of Star Trek fan are you anyway
A realistic one. Nemesis has officially bombed.
Deity
"idg" <indr...@yahoo.com> wrote in message
news:6556f13.02122...@posting.google.com...
Hooray!!!! Another DS9 Fan!!!
I really agree with what he was saying. DS9 just wasn't given a fair shake.
Deity
Deity
I always wanted to know why the people that write for Star Trek don't listen
to the fan input. A llot people (like you) actually have a lot of good ideas
and know the intricate details of the Trek Universe. If "they" had went into
Nemesis with "this is for the fans" they might make a better movie. I
understand that they try to make a stand alone movie but what makes them
think that they are pulling in that many new viewers?
I started watching Trek because of the timeline and the history the show
has. They have encyclopedias dedicated to it. I think that's kinda fun. It
makes the show special. Why not give in to the Trek nerds and geeks? It
seems like avoiding that isn't making the franchise any better off. Like you
said, people used to watch it because it was new and daring. Every time I
watch Enterprise it's always similar to a story that I've seen on another
series so I don't bother. I honestly gave it a chance but I can't get into
it.
Nemesis lacked back story or build up or something.
-----spoilers--------
-
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--
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-
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-
Shinzon was a clone, I'm pretty sure they stated the reason... Oh... to
replace Picard... right. Who thought this plan up? Romulans? Why that plan?
It just seems like a stupid plan.
When I saw the previews I thought since the guy (Shinzon) was saying
"resistance is futile" that perhaps when Picard was Locutus, the Borg had
sampled his DNA and somehow made a Borg Human Morphable Hybrid and the guy
was going to be his surprise son or something complicated like that. Instead
we get this clone, with distant motives, Troi getting psy-violated... again.
lalalalala.... you know the story.
I think the writers of Trek are doing too many drugs or not enough.
Now that "Trek is dead" :( maybe they should write for the people who
actually watch the shows and stop trying to recruit new people with watered
down versions of it.
You know what reminds me of how TOS used to be... Farscape. That show is
wild and daring but I guess not enough because "they" are canceling it.
Thanks for reading my rant,
Deity
Deity
"idg" <indr...@yahoo.com> wrote in message
news:6556f13.02122...@posting.google.com...
> od...@bigfoot.com (O Deus) wrote in message
news:<c6784f8f.02122...@posting.google.com>...
>
> snipped
> > Enterprise kicked off after two Star Trek series that alienated most
> > Star Trek fans and left a shrinking demographic as well as a
> > perception that the franchise was just a money machine cranking out
> > low quality material with the brand name on them.
Deity
"Deity" <no...@crack.com> wrote in message
news:v0l33se...@corp.supernews.com...
> I always wanted to know why the people that write for Star Trek don't
listen
> to the fan input.
I have the answer to my own question....
The writers of Star Trek hate their viewers. They want to torture us because
"the industry" looks down on them for having nerdy fans. They are trying to
be kewl. They are not satisfied with their target audience. We are not good
enough for them. They money that we spend on videos, DVDs, CDs, books,
tapes, autographs, cons, costumes, t-shirts, action figures, and other
miscellaneous memorabilia isn't enough. We are scum and they released
Nemesis to say, "Ha HA Trek nerds, suck on this! You wanna bash us! We'll
give you something to bitch about"
It's a conspiracy to get rid of all of the nerdy fans.
Maureen Goldman
>How dare I what? Point out the fact that Ds9, Voyager and ENT are
>pulling in a fraction of the ratings of TOS and TNG and command a
>fraction of the fanbase. Well don't shoot the messenger, it doesn't
>change the facts.
It isn't an awfully good idea to compare the ratings of any current
show with the olden days of three networks. When TOS began, top-rated
Bonanza was in the early 30 range. (I don't know what ratings TNG
received since it was in syndication and I usually only see those
figures for network shows.)
David B.
>
> indr...@yahoo.com (idg) wrote in message news:<6556f13.02122...@posting.google.com>...
> > od...@bigfoot.com (O Deus) wrote in message news:<c6784f8f.02122...@posting.google.com>...
> >
> > snipped
> > > Both of these disasters had creative and marketing components.
> > > Enterprise kicked off after two Star Trek series that alienated most
> > > Star Trek fans and left a shrinking demographic as well as a
> > > perception that the franchise was just a money machine cranking out
> > > low quality material with the brand name on them.
> > ...
>
> > really, have you ever WATCHED DS9?! or were you just using it to prove
> > your points above? I seriously doubt whether you watched it all along,
> > because then you would have been more informed wrt to this part of
> > your essay. and if you did and you still believe what you wrote, well
> > then, we'll just have to agree to disagree.
>
> Note that I said 'perception' which undeniably does exist. The ratings
> for DS9 also bear out the rather clear fact that it alienated most
> fans and viewers year in and year out.
There's certainly no disputing that. DS9's ratings went down every
season.
idg
OK. I do agree that the perception about DS9 was that it was a
non-event. but I still don't agree with the low quality bit, "red
contact lens demons" (really, the pah wraiths aka former Dukat)
notwithstanding. I mean, really, have you forgotten Troi flying
through the air crying "where ARE you?!" come on. TNG had its lion's
share of idiotic/low quality shows. what DS9 lacked in razzle-dazzle
it made up with mythic passion and pathos and humor and an ability to
poke fun at itself and the whole franchise and genre, and the red
contact lenses didn't detract from that one bit, imo. and don't for a
minute forget that it did give us some of the grittiest and best
action and battle sequences of any Trek. the Wolf 359 sequence in Best
of Both Worlds I was peanuts compared to the DS9 stuff we saw every
week in the 6th and 7th seasons.
anyway, I do agree with most of all your other points though. I should
state that.
thanks and regards.
idg.
ps. and no JSavard, I don't agree that DS9 was boring. tiring, maybe
('cos you had to watch it thru and thru to GET it), but not boring. it
didn't pander to the LCM factor and I suspect that may have bored the
pants off of casual watchers. and maybe baywatchers. ;-)
Gisele La Roche
> How dare I what? Point out the fact that Ds9, Voyager and ENT are
> pulling in a fraction of the ratings of TOS and TNG and command a
> fraction of the fanbase. Well don't shoot the messenger, it doesn't
> change the facts.
First of all it's 4:11 in the morning. I'm the only one up here reveling
in a happy Christmas day, a little buzzed, yes, but I will argue this to
the end anyway as there's no one here (they're all sleeping) to tell me to
go to bed......heh.
You can't compare the ratings for TNG to anything else but TNG. Why?
1. Because when TNG was on the air there was no such thing as: the
Internet, game systems (ie. Nintendo) were fairly new but mainly there was
no other sci-fi program competition.
2. The TV and movie universe were not saturated with Sci-fi. TNG was NEW
and unusual.
3. The TOS and Trek fan base was ready for new Trek.
When DS9 came on the air, it was competing with not only TNG but Voyager.
On top of that, it was competing with a very different entertainment
environment. By the time DS9 came on, there were several sci-fi shows on
the air. It was no longer the ONLY sci-fi program on the air.
>> > Nemesis was a disaster of collosal proportions that will likely
>> > bury the film end of the franchise for the forseeable future, if
>> > not forever.
>
>> Ah SHADDUP
>> what sort of Star Trek fan are you anyway
>
> A realistic one. Nemesis has officially bombed.
Not really. It did not do the best it could do but did well enough to
continue on. Why? Because Star Trek is not an American-only franchise.
It spans the globe. There is more than just the movie aspect to consider.
Star Trek is made up of more than just the movies, think merchandizing.
What starts to dry up in America usually grows in other global markets. In
fact, Nemesis did ok. It wasn't a major moneymaker or blockbuster like say
LOTR. But it isn't aimed at the general public either, unfortunately.
Artsy-fartsy people like Ebert for instance have no idea what Trek is all
about and give it thumbs down but look at what EW gave it for instance.
I don't "completely" dispute what you have to say but consider this:
The fans have stated more than once that they wanted to see the Romulans be
featured in the movies or series. Well, they have been in this latest
movie.
The fans have complained that in Voyager there was no continuity within the
series, no character development, no arcs or continuing storylines.
Well in "Enterprise" we have all those things. TPTB have tried to listen
to the fans. Only now, the bigger PTB, have cut the budget for our newest
Trek series down to the bone. Considering everything, I think Enterprise
is a good show. It needs work. It needs better stories. It
needs........ah who knows what will please fans these days? It's not the
only show out there, the competition is fierce and sci-fi is not NEW
anymore. Trek is 35 years old +. It's amazing that it's still on the air.
What you state above may be true. But in my opinion, I think one of the
biggest problems is that the Trek fan base is fragmented. There are TOS,
TNG, DS9 and Voyager fans. Each base has a loyal following and
unfortunately they are not general Trek fans. I know this because I've had
discussions with so many fans on mailing lists and they all are in their
own camp. It's not the same as the TNG days when Trek was Trek and that
was it. You can't compare those TNG days with the later series.
Sci-fi to begin with and on top of everything else has a much smaller fan
base than say sit-coms or drama series. Looking at the reality of it all,
DS9 did quite well. Voyager did less so but then Voyager was not as
intriguing or as well-written as DS9. It also was aimed at a much younger
crowd. DS9 was aimed at adults. When Voyager came on the air, the idea
was to make it less serious and more action-oriented which it was.
Still, I understand your point of view and in many ways you capture the
"reality" of what is happening with Trek. But you condemn it too quickly.
When TNG came on the air, most fans didn't like it. It took a few years
before it became popular. Enterprise has a much more difficult environment
to work in. I'm giving it a chance because I've seen some things in the
show that are extremely good. The cast is good. The writing, well, if the
owners of the restaurant would let the cooks do the cooking maybe it would
be better.........heh. But it still has a lot of potential.
As for the movies, well, you may or may not know that I and others are
promoting a "Make a DS9 Movie" campaign. We know the chances of a purely
DS9 movie are dismal but we want to make sure that TPTB know that DS9 is
not to be looked over! I think a hybrid movie will be a success next time
around. Ok, don't roll your eyes, I really think that if promoted the
right way, it could bring the Trek fan base together as long as they don't
leave out DS9 characters. Imagine a movie with characters from all the
series, ok, maybe not TOS.
Anyhow, Happy New year to you O Deus. By the way, I don't know if you
know, but I write reviews too. Your reviews of Enterprise haven't been so
gloomy so I'm surprised you wrote this. Regardless, I find your insights
quite delightful and insightful to read.
Take care,
Gisele
Gisele La Roche
Gisele
O Deus
We don't need to. Just take a look at the ratings for DS9 and
Voyager's pilots and the ratings for their final episodes. That tells
the story very nicely.
O Deus
> I always wanted to know why the people that write for Star Trek don't listen
> to the fan input. A llot people (like you) actually have a lot of good ideas
> and know the intricate details of the Trek Universe. If "they" had went into
> Nemesis with "this is for the fans" they might make a better movie. I
> understand that they try to make a stand alone movie but what makes them
> think that they are pulling in that many new viewers?
Some of them do listen at times, but there is no consensus by the fans
on what they want, so there's not a single voice to listen to but
instead we have a lot of people talking at cross-purposes.
idg
I'm a "she" -- that is, if you meant me. :)
and thanks for the vote. :)
indrani.
Boris Badenov
|It isn't an awfully good idea to compare the ratings of any current
|show with the olden days of three networks. When TOS began, top-rated
|Bonanza was in the early 30 range. (I don't know what ratings TNG
|received since it was in syndication and I usually only see those
|figures for network shows.)
The number one show on television today would have been canceled in a heartbeat if it had
pulled the same ratings in the 60's-70's. Networks would have laughed anyone who claimed
these shows were mega-hits out of town. Since there were only three networks, a 30 share
was considered a minimum mark for any show to be viable.
____
Faith is about believing in something, and letting it change you ..
You don't fix faith; faith fixes you. -- Book, Firefly
Boris Badenov
|It's a conspiracy to get rid of all of the nerdy fans.
Too bad it's not working ..
O Deus
There's no denying that. The problem is that DS9 committed itself,
especially in the earlier and later seasons to story arcs on that poor
material. By the time DS9's finale came around, we discovered that
apparently the entire underlying purpose behind the seven years of DS9
we'd been watching had been to get Sisko to prevent the red contact
lens demons from opening the gateway to Bajoran hell and supposedly
destroying the universe.
The up side of arcs is that they give the series a novel like quality
and that's their downside too, because a bad ending for a novel
results in a bad novel. The more you commit to arcs, the harder it is
to shrug off bad episodes the way TNG could, and the more you end up
committing to continuing bad material like the red contact lens demons
in serial form.
> what DS9 lacked in razzle-dazzle
> it made up with mythic passion and pathos and humor and an ability to
> poke fun at itself and the whole franchise and genre, and the red
> contact lenses didn't detract from that one bit, imo.
And what it had in any of this doesn't even begin to offset having a
recurring rat pack hologram who gives romantic advice to the crew,
Garak falling in love with Dukat's daughter, the painfully nauseating
Ferengi family comedies, the beeping helmet people who were supposed
to be the new big threat to the Federation, the red contact lens
demons, Dukat becoming a cartoonish lunatic, tiresome Bajoran rituals
and half the crew seeming to convert to the Bajoran religion and so on
and so forth
I'm not trying to beat up on DS9, I'm just pointing out that the
series wasn't nearly as rosy as its fans like to claim.
> and don't for a
> minute forget that it did give us some of the grittiest and best
> action and battle sequences of any Trek. the Wolf 359 sequence in Best
> of Both Worlds I was peanuts compared to the DS9 stuff we saw every
> week in the 6th and 7th seasons.
Most of the 6th and 7th season battle sequences were repetitive and
uninteresting. Major defeats generally happened offscreen and were
discussed by the charachters (oh last week Betazed was captured by the
Dominion), aside from Rocks and Shoals most of the ground battles were
unoriginal and cliched repetitions of WW2 and Vietnam War movies, a
lot of the space battles relied on technobabble gimmicks, Angels
climax was classic Deus Ex with actual gods making the rescue.
Ron Moore's Tacking Into the Wind actually showed what the Dominion
war should have been, a greater focus on charachters and innovative
storytelling.
> anyway, I do agree with most of all your other points though. I should
> state that.
>
> thanks and regards.
No problem.
O Deus
> od...@bigfoot.com (O Deus) wrote in
> news:c6784f8f.02122...@posting.google.com:
>
> > How dare I what? Point out the fact that Ds9, Voyager and ENT are
> > pulling in a fraction of the ratings of TOS and TNG and command a
> > fraction of the fanbase. Well don't shoot the messenger, it doesn't
> > change the facts.
> You can't compare the ratings for TNG to anything else but TNG. Why?
>
> 1. Because when TNG was on the air there was no such thing as: the
> Internet, game systems (ie. Nintendo) were fairly new but mainly there was
> no other sci-fi program competition.
There were more high profile Science Fiction programs on the air
during TNG's run than there are now. Including SeaQuest and Lois and
Clark which were huge ratings winners. Alien Nation, Alf, Babylon 5
were also on during TNG's run. Today by contrast there are no high
profile SF series on the air on any of the big three networks, Fox has
just cancelled Firefly and UPN and WB's genre offerings are mainly
teen soaps dressed up in genre clothing.
Nor was TNG competiting against SF programs alone. Certainly SF fans
alone were not responsible for more than a fraction of TNG's ratings.
In syndication TNG was competiting against numerous shows and
syndication for one hour dramas did not usually translate into big
ratings.
Game systems predated TNG by quite a bit and while the growth of the
internet, games and cable are often given as explanations for that
decline, the fact is that the number of people who tuned in to the
pilots for Ds9 and Voyager were roughly equivalent to TNG's ratings
but those numbers kept dropping episode by episode and year by year
until they were only a quarter of those viewers left.
And the fact simply remains that one by one those viewers made the
choiche to stop watching.
> 3. The TOS and Trek fan base was ready for new Trek.
That is certainly true.
> When DS9 came on the air, it was competing with not only TNG but Voyager.
> On top of that, it was competing with a very different entertainment
> environment. By the time DS9 came on, there were several sci-fi shows on
> the air. It was no longer the ONLY sci-fi program on the air.
It wasn't much of a competition. The slots weren't slotted against one
another and TNG even had a tie in episode to promote DS9. Patrick
Stewart made an appearance on DS9's pilot. Initally that did get
viewers to tune in to DS9 and then they began tuning out again.
And the claim of a competition really doesn't stand up when you note
that DS9 being cancelled didn't improve Voyager's ratings any. To say
nothing of the fact that cancelling TNG didn't improve Ds9 or
Voyager's ratings. Instead both continued to decline.
> >> > Nemesis was a disaster of collosal proportions that will likely
> >> > bury the film end of the franchise for the forseeable future, if
> >> > not forever.
>
> >> Ah SHADDUP
> >> what sort of Star Trek fan are you anyway
> >
> > A realistic one. Nemesis has officially bombed.
>
> Not really. It did not do the best it could do but did well enough to
> continue on. Why? Because Star Trek is not an American-only franchise.
> It spans the globe. There is more than just the movie aspect to consider.
> Star Trek is made up of more than just the movies, think merchandizing.
> What starts to dry up in America usually grows in other global markets. In
> fact, Nemesis did ok. It wasn't a major moneymaker or blockbuster like say
> LOTR. But it isn't aimed at the general public either, unfortunately.
> Artsy-fartsy people like Ebert for instance have no idea what Trek is all
> about and give it thumbs down but look at what EW gave it for instance.
No I'm afraid that Nemesis bombed. It's barely in the top ten. It will
not make back its budget in domestic release. Not only is it not a
blockbuster, which few Trek films, but it's officially a box office
bomb. Paramount may end up losing money on it. Stewart himself has
said that this is the last film.
And while you're right in that there's plenty of other money making
outlets for Star Trek, it's not likely that Paramount will commit tens
of millions of dollars next time around for another Trek film. There
will be books, there will be games, Enterprise will go on, there will
be toys and all sorts of other items and knicknacks but the film
franchise is likely dead.
> I don't "completely" dispute what you have to say but consider this:
>
> The fans have stated more than once that they wanted to see the Romulans be
> featured in the movies or series. Well, they have been in this latest
> movie.
Well they have...sort of. The only major Romulan charachter in Donatra
whose role is minor at best. The two main villains are a human clone
and a Reman. The Reman's lines mostly ended up on the cutting room
floor. That just leaves the human clone as the major non-TNG cast
charachter in the film. The Romulans themselves are mostly pawns and
minor charachters. So it's not a Romulan feature film in the way that
ST6 was a Klingon feature film.
> The fans have complained that in Voyager there was no continuity within the
> series, no character development, no arcs or continuing storylines.
>
> Well in "Enterprise" we have all those things. TPTB have tried to listen
> to the fans. Only now, the bigger PTB, have cut the budget for our newest
> Trek series down to the bone. Considering everything, I think Enterprise
> is a good show. It needs work. It needs better stories. It
> needs........ah who knows what will please fans these days? It's not the
> only show out there, the competition is fierce and sci-fi is not NEW
> anymore. Trek is 35 years old +. It's amazing that it's still on the air.
Yes it is and Enterprise does need better stories. It seemed to have
found its voice in the early part of the second season with episodes
like Shockwave 2, Minefield, Carbon Creek, Dead Stop and then
plummeted right back down. Still it has clearly improved since the
first season.
> What you state above may be true. But in my opinion, I think one of the
> biggest problems is that the Trek fan base is fragmented. There are TOS,
> TNG, DS9 and Voyager fans. Each base has a loyal following and
> unfortunately they are not general Trek fans. I know this because I've had
> discussions with so many fans on mailing lists and they all are in their
> own camp. It's not the same as the TNG days when Trek was Trek and that
> was it. You can't compare those TNG days with the later series.
Yes that's certainly true too. No question about it, the original Trek
fanbase is aging and a lot of the new fans are committed to one series
and one series only. But while they may badmouth other series, they
still tend to watch them.
> Sci-fi to begin with and on top of everything else has a much smaller fan
> base than say sit-coms or drama series. Looking at the reality of it all,
> DS9 did quite well. Voyager did less so but then Voyager was not as
> intriguing or as well-written as DS9. It also was aimed at a much younger
> crowd. DS9 was aimed at adults. When Voyager came on the air, the idea
> was to make it less serious and more action-oriented which it was.
SciFi's fanbase may not be that large, but aside from soap operas,
they are the largest dedicated fan bases around. Sitcoms don't really
have that kind of organized fandom. They just have ratings.
Voyager did about as well as expected, considering that it was coming
along later in the game when TNG was off the air and DS9 had
disappointed a lot of people. Both shows had a roughly equal ratio of
bad to good episodes, as did TNG and TOS for that matter. Most Trek
series fall into that same pattern.
> Still, I understand your point of view and in many ways you capture the
> "reality" of what is happening with Trek. But you condemn it too quickly.
> When TNG came on the air, most fans didn't like it. It took a few years
> before it became popular. Enterprise has a much more difficult environment
> to work in. I'm giving it a chance because I've seen some things in the
> show that are extremely good. The cast is good. The writing, well, if the
> owners of the restaurant would let the cooks do the cooking maybe it would
> be better.........heh. But it still has a lot of potential.
I'm not condemning it, Enterprise has potential but I'm only covering
the ratings for it and the critical opinion both of which are dropping
faster than the temperature.
> As for the movies, well, you may or may not know that I and others are
> promoting a "Make a DS9 Movie" campaign. We know the chances of a purely
> DS9 movie are dismal but we want to make sure that TPTB know that DS9 is
> not to be looked over! I think a hybrid movie will be a success next time
> around. Ok, don't roll your eyes, I really think that if promoted the
> right way, it could bring the Trek fan base together as long as they don't
> leave out DS9 characters. Imagine a movie with characters from all the
> series, ok, maybe not TOS.
I'd argue in that part that Nemesis ran into trouble because it tried
to cover too many charachters and ended up having to leave a lot of
the material on the cutting room floor making the movie seem too short
and unfocused. Aside from the strong probability that there won't be
another Star Trek film for a long time, DS9 sets would be expensive to
rebuild, Avery Brooks doesn't seem interested and doesn't like Star
Trek to begin with and a fraction of the audience even knows DS9 ever
existed.
> Anyhow, Happy New year to you O Deus. By the way, I don't know if you
> know, but I write reviews too. Your reviews of Enterprise haven't been so
> gloomy so I'm surprised you wrote this. Regardless, I find your insights
> quite delightful and insightful to read.
>
> Take care,
>
> Gisele
Thanks, I know I've read some of your reviews. Whenever I get attacked
for being positive or negative about an Enterprise episodes, I just
point to what other reviewers are saying out there.
Maureen Goldman
>> It isn't an awfully good idea to compare the ratings of any current
>> show with the olden days of three networks. When TOS began, top-rated
>> Bonanza was in the early 30 range. (I don't know what ratings TNG
>> received since it was in syndication and I usually only see those
>> figures for network shows.)
> od...@bigfoot.com (O Deus) wrote:
>We don't need to. Just take a look at the ratings for DS9 and
>Voyager's pilots and the ratings for their final episodes. That tells
>the story very nicely.
In an article at http://www.thefutoncritic.com on shows currently in
their sophomore year, he reports that Enterprise has fallen off 37%
from its first season. (Bernie Mac has had a similar troubling drop.)
I don't know how relevant it is to compare figures with other Trek
shows in other years, but I pay attention to a steep drop-off without
extenuating factors.
My only question would be where the viewers went since I can't think
of anything really popular in the Wednesday 8pm slot.
Gisele La Roche
>> You can't compare the ratings for TNG to anything else but TNG. Why?
>>
>> 1. Because when TNG was on the air there was no such thing as: the
>> Internet, game systems (ie. Nintendo) were fairly new but mainly
>> there was no other sci-fi program competition.
>
> There were more high profile Science Fiction programs on the air
> during TNG's run than there are now. Including SeaQuest and Lois and
> Clark which were huge ratings winners. Alien Nation, Alf, Babylon 5
> were also on during TNG's run. Today by contrast there are no high
> profile SF series on the air on any of the big three networks, Fox has
> just cancelled Firefly and UPN and WB's genre offerings are mainly
> teen soaps dressed up in genre clothing.
True but in TNG's time the competition wasn't nearly as fierce. In
addition, TV and the movies weren't saturated with sci-fi. It's starting
to slow down now I agree but in DS9's time, there were a lot of sci-fi
shows. I have a list somewhere of all the shows that were on during
DS9's run. It's quite long. Same goes for Voyager during its early run.
TNG was fairly novel in its approach to sci-fi at the time as well.
There was nothing like it. There were other sci-fi-like shows but
nothing like TNG. Today, sci-fi is no longer a fresh, new concept on TV
or even in the movies. It's just not the same now or even during DS9's
or Voyager's runs.
> Nor was TNG competiting against SF programs alone. Certainly SF fans
> alone were not responsible for more than a fraction of TNG's ratings.
> In syndication TNG was competiting against numerous shows and
> syndication for one hour dramas did not usually translate into big
> ratings.
But TNG was fairly unique and was Trek after a long wait. The same can't
be said for DS9 or Voyager. Well, DS9 was certainly unique but Voyager
was the same old, same old.
> Game systems predated TNG by quite a bit and while the growth of the
> internet, games and cable are often given as explanations for that
> decline, the fact is that the number of people who tuned in to the
> pilots for Ds9 and Voyager were roughly equivalent to TNG's ratings
> but those numbers kept dropping episode by episode and year by year
> until they were only a quarter of those viewers left.
True but like I said above, the competition was much fiercer for DS9 and
Voyager. DS9 took a while longer as well to develop a dedicated
following if only because of its nature. DS9's ratings were not "that"
bad. Voyager on the other hand barely survived and just really held on
to die-hard Trekkies.
> And the fact simply remains that one by one those viewers made the
> choiche to stop watching.
With DS9 part of the reason was its nature what with arcs and continuing
storylines that made up a good part of its run. It was hard for casual
fans to keep up. I agree with what you say concerning Voyager however.
But that was mainly, I think, because the show was aimed at a younger
audience. Many fans had been spoiled by DS9's writing, depth, character
development (even the secondary characters were well developed) and adult
quality. Think Garak, Nog, Dukat, Kai Winn, and so many others who were
well developed and who were not main characters. On Voyager, Seven (who
was overdone to the maximum), the Doc and Janeway were the only ones who
came close to really being developed.
>> 3. The TOS and Trek fan base was ready for new Trek.
>
> That is certainly true.
And is an important factor to consider when looking at today's Trek
performance. Also, add the fact that sci-fi is no longer fresh or new.
>>When DS9 came on the air, it was competing with not only TNG but
>> Voyager. On top of that, it was competing with a very different
>> entertainment environment. By the time DS9 came on, there were
>> several sci-fi shows on the air. It was no longer the ONLY sci-fi
>> program on the air.
>
> It wasn't much of a competition. The slots weren't slotted against one
> another and TNG even had a tie in episode to promote DS9. Patrick
> Stewart made an appearance on DS9's pilot. Initally that did get
> viewers to tune in to DS9 and then they began tuning out again.
But DS9 wasn't TNG. It was a very different approach to Trek. Those
that kept watching were well rewarded but it took effort to watch in the
early seasons. Not because it was bad but it takes time to get into a
character-driven series. It's easier to get into episodic and action-
driven shows at first if it's well done. It wasn't your typical sci-fi.
> And the claim of a competition really doesn't stand up when you note
> that DS9 being cancelled didn't improve Voyager's ratings any.
Because DS9 fans did not see in Voyager what they saw in DS9. Again, the
fan base became fractured after DS9's run and during I think. Some
people didn't like DS9 because it wasn't an action show. They explored
cultures (Klingon, Cardassian, Bajoran, Ferengi, Trill, and so on). They
explored and developed the villains (the Founders, the Pah-Wraiths).
They explored relationships between the cultures and people. They didn't
explore the new ridged forehead villain or new space anomaly of the week.
The villains were equal in power to the good guys. Look at how the once,
creepy, scary Borg were wimped down on Voyager. DS9 fans just didn't
take to Voyager very well and so did not watch it when DS9 ended.
>To say
> nothing of the fact that cancelling TNG didn't improve Ds9 or
> Voyager's ratings. Instead both continued to decline.
Again, DS9 is a different case than Voyager or TNG because of its nature.
<snip>
>> Not really. It did not do the best it could do but did well enough
>> to continue on. Why? Because Star Trek is not an American-only
>> franchise. It spans the globe. There is more than just the movie
>> aspect to consider. Star Trek is made up of more than just the
>> movies, think merchandizing. What starts to dry up in America
>> usually grows in other global markets. In fact, Nemesis did ok. It
>> wasn't a major moneymaker or blockbuster like say LOTR. But it isn't
>> aimed at the general public either, unfortunately. Artsy-fartsy
>> people like Ebert for instance have no idea what Trek is all about
>> and give it thumbs down but look at what EW gave it for instance.
>
> No I'm afraid that Nemesis bombed. It's barely in the top ten. It will
> not make back its budget in domestic release. Not only is it not a
> blockbuster, which few Trek films, but it's officially a box office
> bomb. Paramount may end up losing money on it. Stewart himself has
> said that this is the last film.
I think they'll make their money back if only because like I said Trek is
not an American-only phenomenon. I agree it wasn't a blockbuster which
is what they wanted, naturally. It may be the end of the film franchise
for a while. But there is always the TV movie or mini-series which I
think might be the way to go. It's to wait and see. The "Make a DS9
Movie" campaign is really about letting TPTB know that the fans of DS9
will not take too kindly to Trek if DS9 is ignored once again in the next
Trek film or whatever. We don't really expect a purely DS9 movie. In
Nemesis they were thinking of having Seven for a while but she was busy
with Boston Public so they had Janeway in the movie instead. DS9 fans
aren't too happy with that.
> And while you're right in that there's plenty of other money making
> outlets for Star Trek, it's not likely that Paramount will commit tens
> of millions of dollars next time around for another Trek film. There
> will be books, there will be games, Enterprise will go on, there will
> be toys and all sorts of other items and knicknacks but the film
> franchise is likely dead.
Agreed but not Trek per se. It all depends on how it does around the
world I suppose. That's why I think they'll go for a TV movie or mini-
series which would work well for DS9. Anyhow, Enterprise's budget has
been cut to the bone so there you go.
>> I don't "completely" dispute what you have to say but consider this:
>>
>> The fans have stated more than once that they wanted to see the
>> Romulans be featured in the movies or series. Well, they have been
>> in this latest movie.
>
> Well they have...sort of. The only major Romulan charachter in Donatra
> whose role is minor at best. The two main villains are a human clone
> and a Reman. The Reman's lines mostly ended up on the cutting room
> floor. That just leaves the human clone as the major non-TNG cast
> charachter in the film. The Romulans themselves are mostly pawns and
> minor charachters. So it's not a Romulan feature film in the way that
> ST6 was a Klingon feature film.
Ok, I was misinformed then. I haven't seen the movie yet. But still,
they were featured nonetheless as far as I know.
>> The fans have complained that in Voyager there was no continuity
>> within the series, no character development, no arcs or continuing
>> storylines.
>>
>> Well in "Enterprise" we have all those things. TPTB have tried to
>> listen to the fans. Only now, the bigger PTB, have cut the budget
>> for our newest Trek series down to the bone. Considering everything,
>> I think Enterprise is a good show. It needs work. It needs better
>> stories. It needs........ah who knows what will please fans these
>> days? It's not the only show out there, the competition is fierce
>> and sci-fi is not NEW anymore. Trek is 35 years old +. It's amazing
>> that it's still on the air.
>
> Yes it is and Enterprise does need better stories. It seemed to have
> found its voice in the early part of the second season with episodes
> like Shockwave 2, Minefield, Carbon Creek, Dead Stop and then
> plummeted right back down. Still it has clearly improved since the
> first season.
Yes and it's early yet. I think it has a lot of potential but after 35+
years I don't expect perfect originality. But as a Niner, I am looking
more for how the characters and cultures are developed. I also like the
odd sci-fi-like eps like TNG's "Cause and Effect" or "Parallels". I
enjoy that type of ep too. I see this in Enterprise. Not at the quality
level of DS9 but it's there. It wasn't in Voyager.
>> What you state above may be true. But in my opinion, I think one of
>> the biggest problems is that the Trek fan base is fragmented. There
>> are TOS, TNG, DS9 and Voyager fans. Each base has a loyal following
>> and unfortunately they are not general Trek fans. I know this
>> because I've had discussions with so many fans on mailing lists and
>> they all are in their own camp. It's not the same as the TNG days
>> when Trek was Trek and that was it. You can't compare those TNG days
>> with the later series.
>
> Yes that's certainly true too. No question about it, the original Trek
> fanbase is aging and a lot of the new fans are committed to one series
> and one series only. But while they may badmouth other series, they
> still tend to watch them.
No they don't. I can't stand Voyager anymore. Oh I watched the last
season because I was doing reviews but if I hadn't been doing them, I
don't think I would have watched faithfully. It was the Jeri Ryan
show.....lol. I liked Seven for a while but got sick of her quickly.
She was just too much the same all the time. She may have had a
variation of emotions she was experiencing every week or variations on
the "exploring her humanity" theme but it was sickening at best towards
the end. They overdid the Doc too but at least he was funny. Janeway,
well, I won't go there.........heh. DS9 fans for the most part did not
take well to Voyager as the ratings show.
<snip>
> SciFi's fanbase may not be that large, but aside from soap operas,
> they are the largest dedicated fan bases around. Sitcoms don't really
> have that kind of organized fandom. They just have ratings.
Well, a heck of a lot of people watch them. True, they don't have
fanbases as such but that's not what counts is it? In fact, shows like
"Futurama" and "Simpsons" did better than Voyager. Why? They're simple
and less complicated programs to watch and appeal to a broader audience.
Not that Voyager was complicated but it was not as easy to watch and sci-
fi is not liked by artsy-fartsy types and there are a lot more of them
than there are sci-fi fans.
> Voyager did about as well as expected, considering that it was coming
> along later in the game when TNG was off the air and DS9 had
> disappointed a lot of people.
But DS9 had/has a very dedicated fanbase. It all depends on how you look
at it. It had roughly 1/2 of the general Trek fanbase. But I suspect
that TNG had non-Trekkers watching it as well as Trekkies. DS9 was for
Trekkers and older Trekkers at that.
>Both shows had a roughly equal ratio of
> bad to good episodes, as did TNG and TOS for that matter. Most Trek
> series fall into that same pattern.
I disagree. Even DS9's worst shows were ten times better than Voyager.
In addition, the quality of acting was way above any of the other Treks.
Take a character like Garak for instance. He was so complex. He had so
many layers and qualities. I can't think of any other Trek where this
can be said of "any" character. Moreover, "most" of the characters on
DS9 were that well developed. Even Morn was developed, less-so than the
others but still developed.
Anyhow, it's all a matter of taste. I liked how DS9 poked fun at the
excesses of Capitalism and how it approached religion and war. They were
serious at times (like the ep where Keiko has a run-in with Vedek Winn
paralleling the Creationist/Theory of Evolution controversy in the
States. They were hilarious at times with the Ferengi. Now if you are
right-wing in your politics you may not have found the Ferengi too funny.
But I loved it. Then again, I'm a Liberal. Also, eps like the one where
Quark sells arms was quite thought provoking and timely. There were so
many layers of DS9 that we could talk forever about all the mythology
that it created.
It's a show that you have to watch completely to really appreciate. I
remember at first I thought that it was kind of tiring to watch the
Bajorans and Kira was annoying at best. But having seen all of the
series, I now appreciate those early seasons because even then they were
so rich and they all work together (the seasons) to make a very,
beautiful story. Voyager on the other hand was a one-note escapade. TNG
was a bit more complex but then it was based on the old TOS premise. It
continued it and as such was special in its own right.
>> Still, I understand your point of view and in many ways you capture
>> the "reality" of what is happening with Trek. But you condemn it too
>> quickly. When TNG came on the air, most fans didn't like it. It
>> took a few years before it became popular. Enterprise has a much
>> more difficult environment to work in. I'm giving it a chance
>> because I've seen some things in the show that are extremely good.
>> The cast is good. The writing, well, if the owners of the restaurant
>> would let the cooks do the cooking maybe it would be
>> better.........heh. But it still has a lot of potential.
>
> I'm not condemning it, Enterprise has potential but I'm only covering
> the ratings for it and the critical opinion both of which are dropping
> faster than the temperature.
Sadly that's true.
>> As for the movies, well, you may or may not know that I and others
>> are promoting a "Make a DS9 Movie" campaign. We know the chances of
>> a purely DS9 movie are dismal but we want to make sure that TPTB know
>> that DS9 is not to be looked over! I think a hybrid movie will be a
>> success next time around. Ok, don't roll your eyes, I really think
>> that if promoted the right way, it could bring the Trek fan base
>> together as long as they don't leave out DS9 characters. Imagine a
>> movie with characters from all the series, ok, maybe not TOS.
>
> I'd argue in that part that Nemesis ran into trouble because it tried
> to cover too many charachters and ended up having to leave a lot of
> the material on the cutting room floor making the movie seem too short
> and unfocused.
Maybe so but that doesn't mean it can't be done.
>Aside from the strong probability that there won't be
> another Star Trek film for a long time, DS9 sets would be expensive to
> rebuild, Avery Brooks doesn't seem interested and doesn't like Star
> Trek to begin with and a fraction of the audience even knows DS9 ever
> existed.
Well I guess the fraction for Voyager is even lower because it had very
bad ratings compared to DS9. Regardless, I think it would be something
to see and would bring in more fans if characters from their preferred
show were featured in the movie. I really think there will be one last
film for Trek and I think it will be a hybrid movie. It's to wait and
see. I doubt it will be a blockbuster but I'll wager that it would do
much better than Nemesis.
Still, I have to say that the Nemesis trailers were very poorly done. I
didn't see anything there to make me want to see the movie. It's because
I am a Trekkie that I will go see it however. I haven't read the
spoilers for it as I want to be surprised but based on the trailers it
doesn't really look that interesting.
Take care,
Gisele
Gisele La Roche
>> OK. I do agree that the perception about DS9 was that it was a
>> non-event. but I still don't agree with the low quality bit, "red
>> contact lens demons" (really, the pah wraiths aka former Dukat)
>> notwithstanding. I mean, really, have you forgotten Troi flying
>> through the air crying "where ARE you?!" come on. TNG had its lion's
>> share of idiotic/low quality shows.
>
> There's no denying that. The problem is that DS9 committed itself,
> especially in the earlier and later seasons to story arcs on that poor
> material. By the time DS9's finale came around, we discovered that
> apparently the entire underlying purpose behind the seven years of DS9
> we'd been watching had been to get Sisko to prevent the red contact
> lens demons from opening the gateway to Bajoran hell and supposedly
> destroying the universe.
Oh goodness, there's so much more to DS9 than that. See my other post
for a more elaborate argument on this. Also, for an even more detailed
look at DS9 go to:
http://www.starfleetlibrary.com/ds9petition and read my tribute to DS9.
I'm not trying to promote the campaign in this post or tooting my own
horn. It's just that the tribute covers more easily the complexity of
DS9 than I could list here. It's rather long but read to the end. You
can skip the list of actors on the show and just go on reading as I talk
about the themes and ideas explored on the show. You have to look at DS9
like it was a multi-colored painting. What you describe above are only
the red patches. You have to look at all the colors of it. It's such a
deep mythology that it requires much more description than what you list
above. Now describe Voyager and you can do it in a paragraph, yes.
> The up side of arcs is that they give the series a novel like quality
> and that's their downside too, because a bad ending for a novel
> results in a bad novel. The more you commit to arcs, the harder it is
> to shrug off bad episodes the way TNG could, and the more you end up
> committing to continuing bad material like the red contact lens demons
> in serial form.
That was just one part of the saga. You have to think of other things as
well. They were limited to a ten episode arc. I agree they could have
done more. Dukat could have been not only insane but more dangerous and
scary. Teri Farrell's (Jadzia) leaving the show meant they had to insert
(at the last minute practically) Nicole De Boer (Ezri) into the show.
This cut in to a lot of the final season. It wasn't the perfect ending
agreed but it was hardly "bad". Again, it's like looking at a painting.
We all see different things when we view one. It all depends on how
deeply you were into the show I think.
>> what DS9 lacked in razzle-dazzle
>> it made up with mythic passion and pathos and humor and an ability to
>> poke fun at itself and the whole franchise and genre, and the red
>> contact lenses didn't detract from that one bit, imo.
Agreed!
> And what it had in any of this doesn't even begin to offset having a
> recurring rat pack hologram who gives romantic advice to the crew,
> Garak falling in love with Dukat's daughter, the painfully nauseating
> Ferengi family comedies, the beeping helmet people who were supposed
> to be the new big threat to the Federation, the red contact lens
> demons, Dukat becoming a cartoonish lunatic, tiresome Bajoran rituals
> and half the crew seeming to convert to the Bajoran religion and so on
> and so forth
Wow, you are skimming here. It's much deeper than that. Read the
tribute and let me know what you think, if you want of course.
> I'm not trying to beat up on DS9, I'm just pointing out that the
> series wasn't nearly as rosy as its fans like to claim.
That's your opinion of course. I feel that way about Voyager and there
are a heck of a lot of Voyager fans who would disagree with me.....heh.
>> and don't for a
>> minute forget that it did give us some of the grittiest and best
>> action and battle sequences of any Trek. the Wolf 359 sequence in
>> Best of Both Worlds I was peanuts compared to the DS9 stuff we saw
>> every week in the 6th and 7th seasons.
Agreed!
> Most of the 6th and 7th season battle sequences were repetitive and
> uninteresting. Major defeats generally happened offscreen and were
> discussed by the charachters (oh last week Betazed was captured by the
> Dominion), aside from Rocks and Shoals most of the ground battles were
> unoriginal and cliched repetitions of WW2 and Vietnam War movies, a
> lot of the space battles relied on technobabble gimmicks, Angels
> climax was classic Deus Ex with actual gods making the rescue.
Disagree!
> Ron Moore's Tacking Into the Wind actually showed what the Dominion
> war should have been, a greater focus on charachters and innovative
> storytelling.
Just one of the many great writers on DS9. This was a character-driven
show however. It had a lot of action in the later season but that wasn't
the focus.
Take care,
Gisele
Gisele La Roche
would do a DS9 movie. Ira Steven Behr (DS9 producer and writer) said he'd
write one. Other DS9 actors (at conventions) have said they would do a
movie. Sadly though, they all don't expect there will be one, ever. It's
up to the fans to change TPTB's mind I guess.
Jonathan Blum
> O Deus wrote:
> > Note that I said 'perception' which undeniably does exist. The ratings
> > for DS9 also bear out the rather clear fact that it alienated most
> > fans and viewers year in and year out.
> There's certainly no disputing that. DS9's ratings went down every
> season.
Actually, there *is* disputing that; ratings for *all* syndicated
dramas went down every season during that time, due in part to two new
networks chewing up prime-time slots which formerly went to syndicated
shows like DS9.
--jon
Jonathan Blum
> I always wanted to know why the people that write for Star Trek don't listen
> to the fan input.
Gosh, maybe it's because hardcore fans, even for Trek, are in fact a
vanishingly small proportion of the viewing audience.
Naaah. Can't be that.
--jon
asdf
><PLONK!>
Someone is in denial...
"When some political or ecclesiastical pamphlet, or novel, or poem is making a
great commotion, you should remember that he who writes for fools always finds
a large public." - Schopenhauer
asdf
>Artsy-fartsy people like Ebert
You don't know Ebert very well if you call him an artsy-fartsy critic.
>But it isn't aimed at the general public either,
<boggle> Of course, it is. </boggle>
>What starts to dry up in America usually grows in other global markets. In
>fact, Nemesis did ok.
Nemesis will take in less than half domestically of what it cost to make. In
no studio universe can that be classified as "ok."
>but look at what EW gave it for instance.
One exception does not a rule make.
>The fans have stated more than once that they wanted to see the Romulans be
>featured in the movies or series. Well, they have been in this latest
>movie.
No. Fans wanted Romulans to be the primary villain in a Trek movie, but got
"vampire-like" Remans instead.
Not the same thing.
asdf
>There were more high profile Science Fiction programs on the air
>during TNG's run than there are now. Including SeaQuest and Lois and
>Clark which were huge ratings winners.
They came on after TNG had already been firmly established as a syndicated hit.
When TNG started it was the basically the only space exploration sci-fi show
of its kind on TV (besides repeats of TOS, Space: 1999, etc.).
In fact, SeaQuest was formulated after the fact of TNG's success as Trek
underwater.
Can you really classify Lois and Clark as sci-fi? It was more of the
superhero/"Moonlighting" romance genre than sci-fi.
>Alien Nation
The closest comtemporary to TNG, but its focus was substantially different.
Alien Nation was more an allegory to contemporary race relations, immigration
issues, crime pathology, etc.
> Alf
C;mon, you can't be seriously classifying Alf as a sci-fi series in the same
genre as TNG sci-fi. It was a sitcom with an alien twist. Mork and Mindy was
even more sci-fi than Alf.
>Babylon 5
>were also on during TNG's run.
It appeared the last season of TNG when TNG was already a huge hit.
>Today by contrast there are no high
>profile SF series on the air on any of the big three networks
Yes, but all the old ones are in heavy repeat rotation now on Sci-Fi channel,
TNN, et al.
I agree with almost all your other points, but Giselle is right that TNG had
almost no competition in the space sci-fi field when it came out. It had the
genre to itself for years... up until the very end of its run when other
studios attempted to mimic TNG's success with their own space sci-fi series...
some quite good, such as B5, and some downright awful... remember Space
Rangers?
Gisele La Roche
news:20021227132131...@mb-cq.aol.com:
>> Gisele La Roche gisele...@yahoo.com wrote:
>>Artsy-fartsy people like Ebert
>
> You don't know Ebert very well if you call him an artsy-fartsy critic.
He generally doesn't like sci-fi. Oh, he'll like the odd movie once in a
while, true. He likes drama better for the most part.
>>But it isn't aimed at the general public either,
>
> <boggle> Of course, it is. </boggle>
This movie was made for Trekkies. At least it was written with the
Trekkie in mind. Check out Julia Houston's review. She explains it
better than I can at this point.
>>What starts to dry up in America usually grows in other global
>>markets. In fact, Nemesis did ok.
>
> Nemesis will take in less than half domestically of what it cost to
> make. In no studio universe can that be classified as "ok."
Let's wait and see how it does around the world. Still, I didn't say
they were going to make bundles of money on it.
>>but look at what EW gave it for instance.
>
> One exception does not a rule make.
Many other reviewers gave it a good grade.
>>The fans have stated more than once that they wanted to see the
>>Romulans be featured in the movies or series. Well, they have been in
>>this latest movie.
>
> No. Fans wanted Romulans to be the primary villain in a Trek movie,
> but got "vampire-like" Remans instead.
> Not the same thing.
Ok...
Gisele
Gisele La Roche
news:75d9a022.02122...@posting.google.com:
Yes, you're right. TV viewing "overall" took a downfall at just about
the time DS9 was starting out and has never recovered. In fact, I recall
how "trash TV" started out just then. It featured Jerry Springer-type
shows and so on. Now they've got "reality" TV and gross-out game shows.
The shrinking ratings were also blamed on the emergence of game-systems
and so on. Later, the Internet also cut into TV viewing. The addition
of new channels and cable also took a toll.
Gisele
Theodoric of York, Medieval Barber
I think there was also more of a richness of character in DS9 than in
any of the other five series. Sisko was the most complex of the five
leads (Picard ranks second), Dukat could've been more rounded, but he
was more interesting than any other villain in the Trek canon, and
Quark made for a fascinating side character. I also liked the way the
Bajoran and Feringi cultures were drawn, and I liked Quark's
resistance to change (the relationship with mother, having to deal
with the threat of a union at his bar, etc.) Liked Garak, too.
>
>> The up side of arcs is that they give the series a novel like quality
>> and that's their downside too, because a bad ending for a novel
>> results in a bad novel. The more you commit to arcs, the harder it is
>> to shrug off bad episodes the way TNG could, and the more you end up
>> committing to continuing bad material like the red contact lens demons
>> in serial form.
>
>That was just one part of the saga. You have to think of other things as
>well. They were limited to a ten episode arc. I agree they could have
>done more. Dukat could have been not only insane but more dangerous and
>scary. Teri Farrell's (Jadzia) leaving the show meant they had to insert
>(at the last minute practically) Nicole De Boer (Ezri) into the show.
>This cut in to a lot of the final season. It wasn't the perfect ending
>agreed but it was hardly "bad". Again, it's like looking at a painting.
>We all see different things when we view one. It all depends on how
>deeply you were into the show I think.
>
I know it's sort of a contrarian view, but I found much to like about
the two hour finale. While there was something lacking in the final
confrontation between Sisko and Dukat, I liked the resolution of the
war arc, particularly the way the aftermath of the war was portrayed.
>>> what DS9 lacked in razzle-dazzle
>>> it made up with mythic passion and pathos and humor and an ability to
>>> poke fun at itself and the whole franchise and genre, and the red
>>> contact lenses didn't detract from that one bit, imo.
>
>Agreed!
>
>> And what it had in any of this doesn't even begin to offset having a
>> recurring rat pack hologram who gives romantic advice to the crew,
>> Garak falling in love with Dukat's daughter, the painfully nauseating
>> Ferengi family comedies, the beeping helmet people who were supposed
>> to be the new big threat to the Federation, the red contact lens
>> demons, Dukat becoming a cartoonish lunatic, tiresome Bajoran rituals
>> and half the crew seeming to convert to the Bajoran religion and so on
>> and so forth
>
>Wow, you are skimming here. It's much deeper than that. Read the
>tribute and let me know what you think, if you want of course.
While he was a distraction and unnecessary, I wasn't that bothered by
the James Darren character. I wouldn't have had him as a recurring
character, but he wasn't quite Trek's Jar Jar Binks.
>
>> I'm not trying to beat up on DS9, I'm just pointing out that the
>> series wasn't nearly as rosy as its fans like to claim.
>
>That's your opinion of course. I feel that way about Voyager and there
>are a heck of a lot of Voyager fans who would disagree with me.....heh.
I have to admit that I'm not a huge fan of the first couple of seasons
of DS9; there are good eps in seasons one and two, but the show took a
while to get its footing (this happened about the time Sisko went
bald). DS9 did have its problems, but the writers were decent, and
the characters were well drawn.
VOY, OTOH, had potential and never really took off, largely thanks to
lackluster writing. Not too far into VOY's run, I was feeling pretty
sorry for Robert Picardo and Robert Beltran. By the end of the show's
run, I was feeling sorry for everybody except Brannon Braga's
girlfriend. You had gimmicks (the Borg kids and the Delta Flyer, for
example) and rehashed plots. What's truly sad is, VOY had a good
premise and a decent cast. Janeway could've been compelling, and the
fact that she wasn't isn't something I blame Kate Mulgrew for. Same
goes for most of the other characters (Chakotay, Tom Paris, Harry
Kim). The only character who was consistently well drawn was the
Doctor, and that was primarily Picardo's doing There are only maybe
two or three standout VOY eps, and the overall quality of the show is
the lowest of the five TV series. I really wanted to like VOY, too
bad it couldn't have been better.
>>> and don't for a
>>> minute forget that it did give us some of the grittiest and best
>>> action and battle sequences of any Trek. the Wolf 359 sequence in
>>> Best of Both Worlds I was peanuts compared to the DS9 stuff we saw
>>> every week in the 6th and 7th seasons.
>
>Agreed!
>
>> Most of the 6th and 7th season battle sequences were repetitive and
>> uninteresting. Major defeats generally happened offscreen and were
>> discussed by the charachters (oh last week Betazed was captured by the
>> Dominion), aside from Rocks and Shoals most of the ground battles were
>> unoriginal and cliched repetitions of WW2 and Vietnam War movies, a
>> lot of the space battles relied on technobabble gimmicks, Angels
>> climax was classic Deus Ex with actual gods making the rescue.
>
>Disagree!
I disagree, also.
>
>> Ron Moore's Tacking Into the Wind actually showed what the Dominion
>> war should have been, a greater focus on charachters and innovative
>> storytelling.
>
>Just one of the many great writers on DS9. This was a character-driven
>show however. It had a lot of action in the later season but that wasn't
>the focus.
I think the real focus of DS9 was the struggle of the main characters
to come to terms with change and how they fit in with their
surroundings. You had Sisko having to deal with being the Emissary,
Odo having to deal with his identity as a changeling, Kira having to
deal with her culture in the wake of a war and brutal occupation, and
Quark having to deal with his culture and religion undergoing change.
DS9 isn't the best of the five TV series (TNG holds that distinction),
but it's a pretty close second, largely thanks to the complexity of
the characters.
Maureen Goldman
>> The up side of arcs is that they give the series a novel like quality
>> and that's their downside too, because a bad ending for a novel
>> results in a bad novel. The more you commit to arcs, the harder it is
>> to shrug off bad episodes the way TNG could, and the more you end up
>> committing to continuing bad material like the red contact lens demons
>> in serial form.
> Gisele La Roche <gisele...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>That was just one part of the saga. You have to think of other things as
>well. They were limited to a ten episode arc. I agree they could have
>done more. Dukat could have been not only insane but more dangerous and
>scary.
It was a poor choice to make Dukat insane. He was a well-drawn and
dangerous character as he was, and certainly not improved. As well, he
had always been shown as a strong individual, unlikely to fly over the
cuckoo's nest because one of his children died, even a favorite child
and in those circumstances.
One character who *was* improved was Damar.
>Teri Farrell's (Jadzia) leaving the show meant they had to insert
>(at the last minute practically) Nicole De Boer (Ezri) into the show.
>This cut in to a lot of the final season.
They didn't have to retain Dax in the show in any form - she was only
reborn to keep some soapy aspects going. Given the large number of
regular cast and ongoing character, this was an extraordinarily poor
time to introduce a new character, much less one with the baggage of
Ezri\Jadzia.
> It wasn't the perfect ending
>agreed but it was hardly "bad". Again, it's like looking at a painting.
>We all see different things when we view one. It all depends on how
>deeply you were into the show I think.
I thought the ending was awful, affecting the way that I viewed the
series. Actually, TNG has had the only really good series finale.
Theodoric of York, Medieval Barber
What's sad is, B and B don't seem to be working to expand the fan
base, either. That's not the only reason newer Trek doesn't have the
cultural cache that old Trek has, but it's part of the reason the
franchise is in the trouble it's in.
>
>--jon
Gisele La Roche
wrote in news:kiip0vo27kk9dppjc...@4ax.com:
They tried with Voyager. They brought in the Borg kiddies; featured
Naomi Wildman more and made Seven a nanny in the process and that's not
counting the already nanny-like Neelix. Janeway was often portrayed as a
mother to the crew. But kiddiefying Trek backfired. It alienated even
more fans. I think it's one of the reasons DS9 fans did not go on to
watch Voyager after DS9 ended. They had been spoiled by a much more
mature and complex show than Voyager ever could be.
Gisele
Maureen Goldman
>Can you really classify Lois and Clark as sci-fi? It was more of the
>superhero/"Moonlighting" romance genre than sci-fi.
If the hero is an alien, then the show is sci-fi. Doesn't matter if
many of the plot problems are common to other genres. (Not sure why
you're putting superhero stuff outside of sci-fi, not that all fit
under the SF umbrella.)
Theodoric of York, Medieval Barber
I agree. I don't think kiddifying Trek pleased much of anybody,
either current fans or potential fans. Then again, the Borg kiddies
and Naomi were sort of a retread of the Wesley Crusher angle, and it's
pretty obvious how most fans feel about Wesley...
Naomi wasn't as bad as she could've been, but the Borg kiddies were
awful. At least on DS9, Jake Sisko wasn't too precocious and stayed
mostly in the background -- he was probably the least annoying of the
juvenile/young adult Trek regulars (most annoying -- Wesley, by a
mile). The John Hughes-style makeover didn't work.
I think the new angle that Enterprise started with -- imperfect
technology, cultural tensions, etc. -- was basically good, but it
hasn't yet really followed through on its promise. Not as
disappointing as VOY, but still disappointing. Instead of putting the
franchise in hiatus, as some have suggested, I'd like to see a decent
new production team (either someone like Moore and Behr from Trek's
best years, or an good creative outsider) come in and try to fix
Enterprise, with new, talented writers. Granted, we've almost
certainly seen the last Trek movie for a while (if ever), but some new
blood may go a long way toward fixing what's wrong with Trek on the
small screen. As it stands, Trek is losing more and more of it's grab
on pop culture. It would be nice to see the franchise revitalized.
>
>Gisele
Ron D
On 27-Dec-2002, "Theodoric of York, Medieval Barber" <theodori...@nospam.org> wrote:
> On Fri, 27 Dec 2002 22:24:27 GMT, Gisele La Roche
> <gisele...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>
> >They tried with Voyager. They brought in the Borg kiddies; featured
> >Naomi Wildman more and made Seven a nanny in the process and that's not
> >counting the already nanny-like Neelix. Janeway was often portrayed as a
> >mother to the crew. But kiddiefying Trek backfired. It alienated even
> >more fans. I think it's one of the reasons DS9 fans did not go on to
> >watch Voyager after DS9 ended. They had been spoiled by a much more
> >mature and complex show than Voyager ever could be.
>
> I agree. I don't think kiddifying Trek pleased much of anybody,
> either current fans or potential fans. Then again, the Borg kiddies
> and Naomi were sort of a retread of the Wesley Crusher angle, and it's
> pretty obvious how most fans feel about Wesley...
>
> >
> >Gisele
Actually, myself, I think the problem is that last line. "They had been spoiled..." They reached
that point long before they added the kiddies. If they had made Voyager a much more mature and
complex show from the beginning, they wouldn't have lost their audience by then. Even without the
kiddies, Voyager was badly handled from the very start.
Ron D.
James Anatidae
news:c6784f8f.02122...@posting.google.com...
> Star Trek is now at its lowest point since the cancellation of the
> Original Series. In some ways Star Trek is even worse off today since
> it has a fraction of the fanbase Star Trek had back then still left.
>
> Two years ago there were two great white hopes that were going to save
> the franchise, Enterprise and Nemesis. Both have failed. Enterprise is
> not gaining viewers but losing them, it's staying alive but it isn't
> doing anything besides surviving. Nemesis was a disaster of collosal
> proportions that will likely bury the film end of the franchise for
> the forseeable future, if not forever.
>
> Enterprise kicked off after two Star Trek series that alienated most
> Star Trek fans and left a shrinking demographic as well as a
> perception that the franchise was just a money machine cranking out
> low quality material with the brand name on them.
>
> lot fewer people and critics were willing to give it a chanche. Where
> during the TOS era, Star Trek had the aura of a daring and promising
> show cancelled before its time, by the time Enterprise premiered the
> situation had long since reversed itself and now had the aura of a
> soulless franchise that nobody but geeks and nerds still liked and
> that should have been put to sleep years ago. Star Trek has
> accumulated a lot of ill will over the years from SciFi fans from its
> own fans and from mainstream viewers. Enterprise's shaky first season
> and lack of engrossing material has not helped either. Now Enterprise
> is yet another dwindling SciFi series dismissed by everyone and
> propping up a shaky network which itself exists only through corporate
> stupidity. In other words Enterprise has gone where DS9 and Voyager
> have already been. Not only has Enterprise not revived Star Trek, but
> it's yet another nail in the coffin of its decline.
>
> Nemesis did have quality problems, mainly due to footage being cut in
> a way that damaged the movie's ability to tell the story, nevertheless
> it was and is the best TNG film ever made. It is also the last because
> it should have been the first. It should have been the movie that
> energized the transition of the TNG franchise to the big screen.
> Instead the franchise went with a disastrous attempt to have Kirk hand
> over the baton. The next two movies were just as bad in terms of
> quality, they had promising elements but they were amateurishly
> scripted, amateurishly directed and were more TV productions, than
> film productions. And by the time Nemesis was announced, Star Trek
> films had come to be viewed the same way that Star Trek TV series had
> come to be viewed, as soulless cash cows for a franchise that had gone
> on too long.
>
> Paramount misread the situation disastrously when the quality of the
> movie and the positive test screening responses led them to schedule
> it as their high profile December release where tough competition
> prevented it from gaining the publicity and the screens it needed
> while gaining the ire of overworked critics trying to protect their
> favorite films like Two Towers and Gangs of New York from competition
> and regurgitating the popular view of the franchise by critically
> savaging Nemesis. And released a mere 5 days before the 800 pound
> gorilla that is the Peter Jackson version of LOTR, it was demographic
> suicide. Since studio executives rarely take responsibility for their
> stupid decisions, Nemesis and Star Trek itself will likely be blamed
> instead. And that will almost certainly end the film franchise unless
> they actually recognize that the problem with Nemesis was not a
> creative failure, as a scheduling failure. But that's not likely,
> nevertheless official Paramount statements on Nemesis should be
> watched carefully for indications of the party line the studio will
> take.
>
> But with Nemesis bombing and Enterprise dying the same slow death as
> every Berman created series, Star Trek is now in real trouble. It has
> lost its film franchise and its grip on the TV franchise is only as
> secure as its sinking ratings and Paramount's continuing commitment to
> UPN. Neither is all that stable and all that certain 5 years from now.
>
> That leaves us right back where the franchise was between TOS's
> cancellation and STTMP's premiere, with Star Trek novels which seem to
> be the only part of the franchise doing really well, with Star Trek
> fandom itself and the fan collaborations, artwork, fanfic,
> conventions, discussions and activity that kept Star Trek alive
> originally.
>
> Obviously Star Trek's fandom has shrunk and much of the more committed
> fanbase is aging. By the time Enterprise goes off the air, they will
> be increasingly less of a factor in any calculations. And in a
> franchise whose younger audience has become increasingly disconnected
> from the franchise's roots and now increasingly consists of fragmented
> fanbases for the different spinoffs, keeping Star Trek alive will be
> more difficult. Star Trek's active fanbase has shrunk. There are much
> fewer people who have seen the latest series and many don't even think
> that Star Trek should survive or that there is any point to keeping it
> alive.
>
> Many are pinning their hopes on a revitalization of Star Trek. Some
> are calling for the removal of Rick Berman, but there is no real
> reason to believe that this would improve things. Rick Berman may
> indeed move on if he takes the fall for Nemesis and Enterprise, but
> statistically speaking, his replacement is likely to be worse, not
> better. And in any case revitalizing Star Trek may at this point be
> near impossible as the case of Nemesis showed. Star Trek has a bad
> reputation, it can't be changed now by simply putting a good product
> out there because neither viewers nor critics will give it a chanche.
> Even were a talented showrunner placed in charge of Enterprise today
> and the show became one of the best series on television, most scifi
> fans, let alone critics and mainstream viewers would continue to
> ignore it or comment on repeat all the usual cliches about the
> franchise.
>
> Still others have proposed taking Star Trek off the air for a while to
> build interest again, but in Hollywood that makes something an
> irrelevant property. Star Trek today exists for two reasons, because
> it's a franchise that Viacom can market and exploit in different ways
> and because it props up UPN. If UPN goes and Star Trek has been gone
> from the air for half a decade or so, it will never come back on the
> air because attention will have shifted to other properties and Star
> Trek will not be revived simply to prop up the merchandising licenses.
>
> So what is to be done? Not much. Star Trek will still remain on TV
> through some lucky factors. Star Trek fandom will maintain some of the
> franchise's presence and merchandising sales. Beyond that, all good
> things must end. TV shows don't last forever. There was a time when
> Star Trek seemed like it might be special, like it might be the
> exception. That time is past. Star Trek in its various incarnations
> has gone on longer and done more than any other SF show out there. Its
> best stuff has sunk into popular culture, it has inspired kids to
> become scientists and astronauts. It's become a part of history. But
> history is the record of things past and keeping Star Trek alive may
> now have become impossible. Ultimately Kirk had to face his own
> mortality and the time to do so the same may have come for Star Trek
> itself.
>
> Of course things seemed pretty hopeless back when Star Trek was first
> cancelled. There were three networks and Star Trek was an expensive
> show to do. The actors, the writers and the producers went on their
> way to other jobs sure that the whole thing was over. It wasn't though
> but the set of events that brought Star Trek back on the air were not
> predictable back then and the set of events that might revive Star
> Trek may not be predictable now. For now Star Trek is still hanging on
> and who knows what tommorow will still bring. It might take careful
> watching to spot the Vulcan mind meld and Genesis plot devices that
> can create life from lifelessness and cheat death one more time.
Great insight into the problems that Star Trek faces.
James Anatidae
well.
space
boring, and didn't really watch it again until recently. After I heard
about the dominion wars, I started watching it periodically, and what I
found was that the later seasons was quite good. As well, I found that
minor/recurring characters were quite while developed, and the show isn't
too predicable. So, I am regretting that I didn't watch the entire show in
order. Granted there were some episodes and concepts that I find borings,
or silly, but all in all I think it was a very good show. Voyager on the
other hand was quite boring to me. There were too many errors, mistakes,
and convienent tech-babble solutions, especially after they had 7 of 9 on.
The only reason why I watch it is because 7 of 9's figure. Say what you
will, but that's pretty much the only thing that made most of the Voyager
epsiodes watchable, especially the Borg eps, where I actually feel sorry
for the Borgs.
Oh yeah, mixed cast Star Trek movie would be great. With a good story
line, I think that might be the way to go for future movies if they will be
any. Though just to point out, technically Worf is a DS9 character as
well, so you could say Nemesis had DS9 cast.
Cory C. Albrecht
>1. Because when TNG was on the air there was no such thing as: the
>Internet, game systems (ie. Nintendo) were fairly new but mainly there was
>no other sci-fi program competition.
Nitpick: The Internet did too exist when TNG started - it just wasn't
the big commercialized thing it is today. Usenet was something totally
different from the Internet and AOL was a glorified BBS and not
connected to the Internet. I first got connected to the 'Net in 1989
when started university, and I remember accessing archives of stuff that
were more than 2 years old.
--
Cory C. Albrecht
http://ratings.fenris.dyndns.info/ - go add your votes for various
Star Trek episdoes! (I need testers for things I add to client sites :-)
asdf
>>Can you really classify Lois and Clark as sci-fi? It was more of the
>>superhero/"Moonlighting" romance genre than sci-fi.
>
>If the hero is an alien, then the show is sci-fi.
So Alf is then sci-fi? Mork and Mindy is then a sci-fi show? Third Rock from
the Sun is sci-fi then, right? They are not sci-fi, they are situational
comedies, or sitcoms for short.
Lois and Clark, Batman, Smallville, and others of their ilk are not sci-fi,
they are a part of a separate genre called "superheroes."
They're apples and oranges. Just because the hero comes from another planet
does not necessarily mean the show is sci-fi.
> (Not sure why
>you're putting superhero stuff outside of sci-fi, not that all fit
>under the SF umbrella.)
Because they are a separate genre.
asdf
>> You don't know Ebert very well if you call him an artsy-fartsy critic.
>
>He generally doesn't like sci-fi. Oh, he'll like the odd movie once in a
>while, true. He likes drama better for the most part.
But he ain't artsy-fartsy. One thing I like about Ebert is he tries to put
himself in the mindset of the target audience for a movie when he judges it.
Titanic was undoubtedly a great movie... for teenage girls.
>This movie was made for Trekkies. At least it was written with the
>Trekkie in mind.
The latter is true, but the former is too absolute. The studio will always
keep the general public in mind when formulating its major holiday release.
>> Nemesis will take in less than half domestically of what it cost to
>> make. In no studio universe can that be classified as "ok."
>
>Let's wait and see how it does around the world. Still, I didn't say
>they were going to make bundles of money on it.
It has a good chance to break even with the international box office, but it's
still a domestic flop. International B.O. is the gravy train after the studio
has already recouped its investment domestically.
>Many other reviewers gave it a good grade.
One can always find a "minor" reviewer somewhere who loved a certain movie. A
certain studio got caught a little while back creating reviewers to give its
turkeys good review blurbs in ads. Check http://www.rottentomatoes.com to get
a good overview of opinions on any movie.
>> No. Fans wanted Romulans to be the primary villain in a Trek movie,
>> but got "vampire-like" Remans instead.
>> Not the same thing.
>
>Ok...
Actually it's even worse than I stated. Fans wanted a Romulan war, but instead
got one Reman on-screen for a short bit, and most of the other time spent on a
clone villain. It makes no sense to invent new villains when there is already
an excellent one out there, ie. Romulans.
23skidoo...@lycos.com
I do wholeheartedly agree however that scheduling Nemesis the week of
Two Towers are outright stupid on the part of Paramount. IMO I would
have held the film until spring, or at least January. All the
pre-release talk about it being butchered and how the DVD would be the
director's cut probably helped kill it as well, at least among Trek
fans. It's one reason I haven't bothered going - why pay $13.50
(Canadian going rate for movie prices) to see an incomplete film?
Cheers
Alex
Gisele La Roche
news:20021228194618...@mb-mn.aol.com:
>>Gisele La Roche gisele...@yahoo.com wrote:
>>> You don't know Ebert very well if you call him an artsy-fartsy
>>> critic.
>>
>>He generally doesn't like sci-fi. Oh, he'll like the odd movie once
>>in a while, true. He likes drama better for the most part.
>
> But he ain't artsy-fartsy. One thing I like about Ebert is he tries
> to put himself in the mindset of the target audience for a movie when
> he judges it. Titanic was undoubtedly a great movie... for teenage
> girls.
Lol, ok. He just gives me that impression for some reason. I never see
him rate sci-fi movies well. He always seems to say they are basically
silly movies. In the case of Nemesis, his partner Roeper liked it, Ebert
didn't, which doesn't surprise me in the least.
>>> Nemesis will take in less than half domestically of what it cost to
>>> make. In no studio universe can that be classified as "ok."
>>
>>Let's wait and see how it does around the world. Still, I didn't say
>>they were going to make bundles of money on it.
>
> It has a good chance to break even with the international box office,
> but it's still a domestic flop. International B.O. is the gravy train
> after the studio has already recouped its investment domestically.
True...
>>Many other reviewers gave it a good grade.
>
> One can always find a "minor" reviewer somewhere who loved a certain
> movie. A certain studio got caught a little while back creating
> reviewers to give its turkeys good review blurbs in ads. Check
> http://www.rottentomatoes.com to get a good overview of opinions on
> any movie.
Gene Siskel, Roeper from Ebert and Roeper, EW and others have all given
it thumbs up. I have trouble arguing on this because I still haven't
seen the movie which I plan to do tomorrow. It's difficult to have
conviction when arguing about something you don't know about........heh.
Take care and Happy New Year!
Gisele
O Deus
> > Maureen Goldman
> >> It isn't an awfully good idea to compare the ratings of any current
> >> show with the olden days of three networks. When TOS began, top-rated
> >> Bonanza was in the early 30 range. (I don't know what ratings TNG
> >> received since it was in syndication and I usually only see those
> >> figures for network shows.)
>
> > od...@bigfoot.com (O Deus) wrote:
> >We don't need to. Just take a look at the ratings for DS9 and
> >Voyager's pilots and the ratings for their final episodes. That tells
> >the story very nicely.
>
> In an article at http://www.thefutoncritic.com on shows currently in
> their sophomore year, he reports that Enterprise has fallen off 37%
> from its first season. (Bernie Mac has had a similar troubling drop.)
> I don't know how relevant it is to compare figures with other Trek
> shows in other years, but I pay attention to a steep drop-off without
> extenuating factors.
>
> My only question would be where the viewers went since I can't think
> of anything really popular in the Wednesday 8pm slot.
Neither can I. but there are plenty of other options that people have
besides watching TV. I've skipped a few Enterprise episodes myself.
Theodoric of York, Medieval Barber
"Gisele La Roche" <gisele...@yahoo.com> wrote in message
news:Xns92F2D22B6F0F8gi...@66.185.95.104...
> >
> > One can always find a "minor" reviewer somewhere who loved a certain
> > movie. A certain studio got caught a little while back creating
> > reviewers to give its turkeys good review blurbs in ads. Check
> > http://www.rottentomatoes.com to get a good overview of opinions on
> > any movie.
>
> Gene Siskel, Roeper from Ebert and Roeper, EW and others have all given
> it thumbs up.
I think it's pretty safe to assume that Gene Siskel hasn't seen "Nemesis"...
:-) Did you mean Gene Shalit?
Gisele La Roche
wrote in news:A2uP9.54196$842....@news1.fdn.com:
Lol, yes. Oh my, I think I'm going to need a vacation from this holiday
after it's over......heh.
Gisele
O Deus
> True but in TNG's time the competition wasn't nearly as fierce. In
> addition, TV and the movies weren't saturated with sci-fi. It's starting
> to slow down now I agree but in DS9's time, there were a lot of sci-fi
> shows. I have a list somewhere of all the shows that were on during
> DS9's run. It's quite long. Same goes for Voyager during its early run.
> TNG was fairly novel in its approach to sci-fi at the time as well.
> There was nothing like it. There were other sci-fi-like shows but
> nothing like TNG. Today, sci-fi is no longer a fresh, new concept on TV
> or even in the movies. It's just not the same now or even during DS9's
> or Voyager's runs.
TNG wasn't all that original and it took a while to get off the
ground. But the final results were proffesional and polished and
enough people had fond memories of TOS to want to tune in. Outside of
genre SF fans, SF shows don't really compete against each other
anymore than Law and Order competes with CSI or ER competes with
Presidio Med. They're just similarly themed shows.
Saturation really isn't the problem that people make it out to be. But
the fact that Star Trek is the butt of jokes with mainstream audiences
and is viewed with contempt by genre fans is a problem. But this is
caused by a variety of factors.
> > Game systems predated TNG by quite a bit and while the growth of the
> > internet, games and cable are often given as explanations for that
> > decline, the fact is that the number of people who tuned in to the
> > pilots for Ds9 and Voyager were roughly equivalent to TNG's ratings
> > but those numbers kept dropping episode by episode and year by year
> > until they were only a quarter of those viewers left.
>
> True but like I said above, the competition was much fiercer for DS9 and
> Voyager. DS9 took a while longer as well to develop a dedicated
> following if only because of its nature. DS9's ratings were not "that"
> bad. Voyager on the other hand barely survived and just really held on
> to die-hard Trekkies.
DS9 and Voyager pulled in ratings that weren't that far apart when you
compensate for the fact that Voyager was a network series and DS9 was
in syndication and its figures were calculated differently. And
competition has become fiercer for all shows and TV ratings in general
have declined, but nevertheless shows can still be succesfull. DS9 and
Voyager were not obscure shows that had to be discovered, their pilot
ratings clearly testify that the TNG audience tuned in to them and
then tuned out again. That's not merely a question of competition, but
an audience sampling those shows and deciding not to watch anymore.
> >>When DS9 came on the air, it was competing with not only TNG but
> >> Voyager. On top of that, it was competing with a very different
> >> entertainment environment. By the time DS9 came on, there were
> >> several sci-fi shows on the air. It was no longer the ONLY sci-fi
> >> program on the air.
> >
> > It wasn't much of a competition. The slots weren't slotted against one
> > another and TNG even had a tie in episode to promote DS9. Patrick
> > Stewart made an appearance on DS9's pilot. Initally that did get
> > viewers to tune in to DS9 and then they began tuning out again.
>
> But DS9 wasn't TNG. It was a very different approach to Trek. Those
> that kept watching were well rewarded but it took effort to watch in the
> early seasons. Not because it was bad but it takes time to get into a
> character-driven series. It's easier to get into episodic and action-
> driven shows at first if it's well done. It wasn't your typical sci-fi.
Actually it was often was bad. Certainly in the first season. Witness
'If Wishes Were Horses', 'Babel' and 'Move Along Home.' Not to mention
the endlessly tedious Bajoran religion. But then DS9 kept trying to
reinvent itself and get back viewers. It brought in the Defiant to get
away from being a purely station bound series, it brought in the
Dominion as a big bad enemy, it brought in Worf and the Klingons as a
move of desperation to get back some of TNG's audience. And time and
time again it failed. The problem is that DS9 seemed to want to be
Babylon 5 instead of Star Trek and that turned viewers off. Especially
since there already was a Babylon 5 on the air.
> > And the claim of a competition really doesn't stand up when you note
> > that DS9 being cancelled didn't improve Voyager's ratings any.
>
> Because DS9 fans did not see in Voyager what they saw in DS9. Again, the
> fan base became fractured after DS9's run and during I think.
And many had been watching both shows all along, just as many Voyager
viewers had also been watching DS9. There was a competition in terms
of exclusive fanbases who attacked each other's shows, but Star Trek
fans were disappointed by both shows and DS9 and Voyager fans still
seemed to watch each other's shows...if only to attack them.
> Some
> people didn't like DS9 because it wasn't an action show.
DS9 had no shortage of action. DS9 had two wars and endless amounts of
battle scenes ranging into the downright gruesome. I particularly
could have done without the scene of a Jem'Haddar snapping a
Cardassian's back over his knee.
> They explored
> cultures (Klingon, Cardassian, Bajoran, Ferengi, Trill, and so on).
Well they explored the Bajorans in the earlier seasons until the
audience got bored, eventually they brought back the Bajorans as pawns
in a ridiculous Book of Revelations style plot.
> They
> explored and developed the villains (the Founders, the Pah-Wraiths).
We knew something about The Founders, we really knew nothing about the
Pah Wraiths. Rosalind Chao turned in a great performance as a possesed
Keiko but the producers decided that it would be much more terrifying
if the people had red contact lenses and talked like the Exorcist. We
never learned much about the Pah Wraiths except that they were evil in
the most cliched sense, mainly because we were told it over and over
again. We never learned much about the Prophets over and over again,
except that they were good and we were told this over and over again
too. There was no real proof of it though either.
> They explored relationships between the cultures and people. They didn't
> explore the new ridged forehead villain or new space anomaly of the week.
Yes aside from the Dominion, DS9 mainly imported TNG races like the
Cardassians, Bajorans and Klingons and Ferengi and continued their
storylines. DS9 was pretty bad at producing any original races.
> The villains were equal in power to the good guys. Look at how the once,
> creepy, scary Borg were wimped down on Voyager. DS9 fans just didn't
> take to Voyager very well and so did not watch it when DS9 ended.
Yes and look how Dukat was turned from an interesting charachter into
a rambling lunatic against the best efforts of Alaimo, while Ira Behr
helpfully explained that anyone who objected to this move liked Nazis.
> >> Not really. It did not do the best it could do but did well enough
> >> to continue on. Why? Because Star Trek is not an American-only
> >> franchise. It spans the globe. There is more than just the movie
> >> aspect to consider. Star Trek is made up of more than just the
> >> movies, think merchandizing. What starts to dry up in America
> >> usually grows in other global markets. In fact, Nemesis did ok. It
> >> wasn't a major moneymaker or blockbuster like say LOTR. But it isn't
> >> aimed at the general public either, unfortunately. Artsy-fartsy
> >> people like Ebert for instance have no idea what Trek is all about
> >> and give it thumbs down but look at what EW gave it for instance.
> >
> > No I'm afraid that Nemesis bombed. It's barely in the top ten. It will
> > not make back its budget in domestic release. Not only is it not a
> > blockbuster, which few Trek films, but it's officially a box office
> > bomb. Paramount may end up losing money on it. Stewart himself has
> > said that this is the last film.
>
> I think they'll make their money back if only because like I said Trek is
> not an American-only phenomenon.
Foreign box office is not going to compensate for Nemesis pulling in
far less than its budget domestically. Star Trek does well overseas,
but not that well.
> I agree it wasn't a blockbuster which
> is what they wanted, naturally. It may be the end of the film franchise
> for a while. But there is always the TV movie or mini-series which I
> think might be the way to go. It's to wait and see. The "Make a DS9
> Movie" campaign is really about letting TPTB know that the fans of DS9
> will not take too kindly to Trek if DS9 is ignored once again in the next
> Trek film or whatever. We don't really expect a purely DS9 movie. In
> Nemesis they were thinking of having Seven for a while but she was busy
> with Boston Public so they had Janeway in the movie instead. DS9 fans
> aren't too happy with that.
I would have liked to see them bring in O'Brien, though he was really
a TNG charachter. The TV movie isn't a bad idea, especially since the
ratings tend to spike for event episodes and would likely spike even
further for TV movies. But TV movies would still be expensive, and
with Voyager off the run, any movie would have to build new sets which
would be an expensive proposition again and with no real second run
syndication value. So it would be a tough sell from a commercial
standpoint.
> >> The fans have complained that in Voyager there was no continuity
> >> within the series, no character development, no arcs or continuing
> >> storylines.
> >>
> >> Well in "Enterprise" we have all those things. TPTB have tried to
> >> listen to the fans. Only now, the bigger PTB, have cut the budget
> >> for our newest Trek series down to the bone. Considering everything,
> >> I think Enterprise is a good show. It needs work. It needs better
> >> stories. It needs........ah who knows what will please fans these
> >> days? It's not the only show out there, the competition is fierce
> >> and sci-fi is not NEW anymore. Trek is 35 years old +. It's amazing
> >> that it's still on the air.
> >
> > Yes it is and Enterprise does need better stories. It seemed to have
> > found its voice in the early part of the second season with episodes
> > like Shockwave 2, Minefield, Carbon Creek, Dead Stop and then
> > plummeted right back down. Still it has clearly improved since the
> > first season.
>
> Yes and it's early yet. I think it has a lot of potential but after 35+
> years I don't expect perfect originality. But as a Niner, I am looking
> more for how the characters and cultures are developed. I also like the
> odd sci-fi-like eps like TNG's "Cause and Effect" or "Parallels". I
> enjoy that type of ep too. I see this in Enterprise. Not at the quality
> level of DS9 but it's there. It wasn't in Voyager.
Well we might see by Season 3 if Enterprise is really going anywhere
or not. Theproblem is most viewers aren't patient enough to wait
around that long.
> No they don't. I can't stand Voyager anymore. Oh I watched the last
> season because I was doing reviews but if I hadn't been doing them, I
> don't think I would have watched faithfully. It was the Jeri Ryan
> show.....lol. I liked Seven for a while but got sick of her quickly.
> She was just too much the same all the time. She may have had a
> variation of emotions she was experiencing every week or variations on
> the "exploring her humanity" theme but it was sickening at best towards
> the end. They overdid the Doc too but at least he was funny. Janeway,
> well, I won't go there.........heh. DS9 fans for the most part did not
> take well to Voyager as the ratings show.
Season 7 was weak, Season 6 was a lot stronger. Ryan's addition was
unfortunate and aside from One and Dark Frontier, she was mostly
wasted screen time. But for whatever reason you watched, so did quite
a few other people. I tuned in to Ds9's final season even it was
borderline unwatchable and I hated the show by that point. Watching
Star Trek may be a hard habit to break...
> > SciFi's fanbase may not be that large, but aside from soap operas,
> > they are the largest dedicated fan bases around. Sitcoms don't really
> > have that kind of organized fandom. They just have ratings.
>
> Well, a heck of a lot of people watch them. True, they don't have
> fanbases as such but that's not what counts is it? In fact, shows like
> "Futurama" and "Simpsons" did better than Voyager. Why? They're simple
> and less complicated programs to watch and appeal to a broader audience.
> Not that Voyager was complicated but it was not as easy to watch and sci-
> fi is not liked by artsy-fartsy types and there are a lot more of them
> than there are sci-fi fans.
Futurama has essentially been cancelled and its ratings were never
that great to begin with. The Simpsons was\is a pop culture phenomenon
and will be watched till doomsday. But then both shows were also in
good time slots on a major network and were well promoted. Even on
UPN, Voyager and Enterprise don't reach many parts of the country and
the promotion is rather poor.
> >Both shows had a roughly equal ratio of
> > bad to good episodes, as did TNG and TOS for that matter. Most Trek
> > series fall into that same pattern.
>
> I disagree. Even DS9's worst shows were ten times better than Voyager.
Really? Time's Orphan? If Wishes Were Horses? Take Me Out to the
Holosuite? Move Along Home? The Reckoning?
Every series has its bad and its good episodes in roughly the same
ratio. It's the overall package of premise, charachters and
storytelling style that attracts or repels viewers.
> In addition, the quality of acting was way above any of the other Treks.
> Take a character like Garak for instance. He was so complex. He had so
> many layers and qualities. I can't think of any other Trek where this
> can be said of "any" character. Moreover, "most" of the characters on
> DS9 were that well developed. Even Morn was developed, less-so than the
> others but still developed.
Some were well developed and well acted, some weren't. Garak was well
acted, Ziyal 3 had some of the worst acting I've ever seen on
television. The actors playing Leeta and Nog were quite poor. And
Terry Farrel was rather mediocre.
But that's true of all Star Trek series. There are a few serious top
notch actors and there's everyone else.
> Anyhow, it's all a matter of taste. I liked how DS9 poked fun at the
> excesses of Capitalism and how it approached religion and war. They were
> serious at times (like the ep where Keiko has a run-in with Vedek Winn
> paralleling the Creationist/Theory of Evolution controversy in the
> States.
Yes that was back when DS9 seemed ready to question Bajoran religion
as opposed to the later seasons, when it was adopted as the one true
faith superseding Starfleet and Sisko began taking his orders from the
'Prophets' It was a long road from Kirk teling Apollo to go to hell
and Picard telling Q to do the same to DS9 endorsing the worship of
powerful aliens.
> >> As for the movies, well, you may or may not know that I and others
> >> are promoting a "Make a DS9 Movie" campaign. We know the chances of
> >> a purely DS9 movie are dismal but we want to make sure that TPTB know
> >> that DS9 is not to be looked over! I think a hybrid movie will be a
> >> success next time around. Ok, don't roll your eyes, I really think
> >> that if promoted the right way, it could bring the Trek fan base
> >> together as long as they don't leave out DS9 characters. Imagine a
> >> movie with characters from all the series, ok, maybe not TOS.
> >
> > I'd argue in that part that Nemesis ran into trouble because it tried
> > to cover too many charachters and ended up having to leave a lot of
> > the material on the cutting room floor making the movie seem too short
> > and unfocused.
>
> Maybe so but that doesn't mean it can't be done.
Possibly, but it might be rather hard to do in under two hours.
There's a reason most Star Trek films have a fairly simple premise and
storyline and not too many charachters.
> >Aside from the strong probability that there won't be
> > another Star Trek film for a long time, DS9 sets would be expensive to
> > rebuild, Avery Brooks doesn't seem interested and doesn't like Star
> > Trek to begin with and a fraction of the audience even knows DS9 ever
> > existed.
>
> Well I guess the fraction for Voyager is even lower because it had very
> bad ratings compared to DS9.
Undoubtedly. Berman was setting his sights on bringing Enterprise to
screen but that's looking less likely. Any non-TNG film would now
involve a new cast, perhaps with one or two celebrity Trekkers making
an apperance.
> Still, I have to say that the Nemesis trailers were very poorly done. I
> didn't see anything there to make me want to see the movie. It's because
> I am a Trekkie that I will go see it however. I haven't read the
> spoilers for it as I want to be surprised but based on the trailers it
> doesn't really look that interesting.
I was personally happy with them and I think Nemesis could have been a
good movie if it hadn't been cut so badly. It's certainly a movie made
for the fans with any number of continuity refferences.
O Deus
> > Gisele La Roche gisele...@yahoo.com wrote:
> >Artsy-fartsy people like Ebert
>
> You don't know Ebert very well if you call him an artsy-fartsy critic.
It's not an unfair summation. He promotes indies and Miramax type
films at the expense of more mainstream movies. That was the whole
concept of the Siskel and Ebert and now Ebert and Roeper pairing .
Siskel\Roeper was the more voice of the common man critic, while Ebert
was the voice of cineate critic.
> >The fans have stated more than once that they wanted to see the Romulans be
> >featured in the movies or series. Well, they have been in this latest
> >movie.
>
> No. Fans wanted Romulans to be the primary villain in a Trek movie, but got
> "vampire-like" Remans instead.
> Not the same thing.
Not quite, but Viceroy would have worked much better if all of
Perlman's lines hadn't been cut leaving him as an evil sidekick.
O Deus
> In article <Xns92F0372E45C83gi...@66.185.95.104>, Gisele La Roche <gisele...@yahoo.com> wrote:
> >1. Because when TNG was on the air there was no such thing as: the
> >Internet, game systems (ie. Nintendo) were fairly new but mainly there was
> >no other sci-fi program competition.
>
> Nitpick: The Internet did too exist when TNG started - it just wasn't
> the big commercialized thing it is today. Usenet was something totally
> different from the Internet and AOL was a glorified BBS and not
> connected to the Internet. I first got connected to the 'Net in 1989
> when started university, and I remember accessing archives of stuff that
> were more than 2 years old.
True and we could even go back to the BBS and WELL days. Services like
CompuServe, Prodigy and AOL were also around during TNG's run. But
they didn't have a fraction of the impact that the internet does
today.
Gisele La Roche
post.....:oD
od...@bigfoot.com (O Deus) wrote in
news:c6784f8f.02122...@posting.google.com:
> TNG wasn't all that original and it took a while to get off the
> ground.
It was at that time for TV. I agree in other avenues it wasn't that
original.
>But the final results were proffesional and polished and
> enough people had fond memories of TOS to want to tune in. Outside of
> genre SF fans, SF shows don't really compete against each other
> anymore than Law and Order competes with CSI or ER competes with
> Presidio Med. They're just similarly themed shows.
You are kidding. Have you ever been to a Star Wars vs Star Trek board or
a Farscape vs Enterprise or any combination thereof? You don't see that
for any other genre except sci-fi and fantasy. Fans of sci-fi are very
outspoken and usually very loyal to "their" respective shows.
> Saturation really isn't the problem that people make it out to be. But
> the fact that Star Trek is the butt of jokes with mainstream audiences
> and is viewed with contempt by genre fans is a problem. But this is
> caused by a variety of factors.
So are Star Wars fans.......heh. As for the joking, that's usually a
good sign. Contempt on the other hand is not. Oh well...
> DS9 and Voyager pulled in ratings that weren't that far apart when you
> compensate for the fact that Voyager was a network series and DS9 was
> in syndication and its figures were calculated differently. And
> competition has become fiercer for all shows and TV ratings in general
> have declined, but nevertheless shows can still be succesfull. DS9 and
> Voyager were not obscure shows that had to be discovered, their pilot
> ratings clearly testify that the TNG audience tuned in to them and
> then tuned out again. That's not merely a question of competition, but
> an audience sampling those shows and deciding not to watch anymore.
True but Voyager was promoted "heavily" by Paramount. DS9 did not get
that much promotion. Still, I understand what you're saying but you have
to look at things "overall". When you isolate the parts of the argument,
it doesn't hold as well. I agree that DS9 and Voyager did not have the
viewership they had on TNG but there are other factors involved which I
won't repeat. Also, fans weren't as ready to give the new shows a chance
other than the hardcore Trek fans. If TNG were to come on TV now,
especially with the first few seasons as they were, I doubt it would get
the same following. Fans back then wanted a new Trek show. I don't
think they were ready for DS9 or even Voyager. Many were loyal to TNG.
The fracturing of the fan base was already there when DS9 came on.
>> But DS9 wasn't TNG. It was a very different approach to Trek. Those
>> that kept watching were well rewarded but it took effort to watch in
>> the early seasons. Not because it was bad but it takes time to get
>> into a character-driven series. It's easier to get into episodic and
>> action- driven shows at first if it's well done. It wasn't your
>> typical sci-fi.
>
> Actually it was often was bad. Certainly in the first season. Witness
> 'If Wishes Were Horses', 'Babel' and 'Move Along Home.' Not to mention
> the endlessly tedious Bajoran religion. But then DS9 kept trying to
> reinvent itself and get back viewers. It brought in the Defiant to get
> away from being a purely station bound series, it brought in the
> Dominion as a big bad enemy, it brought in Worf and the Klingons as a
> move of desperation to get back some of TNG's audience. And time and
> time again it failed. The problem is that DS9 seemed to want to be
> Babylon 5 instead of Star Trek and that turned viewers off. Especially
> since there already was a Babylon 5 on the air.
I disagree with this of course. I loved those eps.........heh. But as
for Worf, he was supposed to be in one or two eps but Ira Steven Behr
liked what he saw and decided to keep him on. I suspect Ronald D. Moore
wanted him too as he is the main "Klingon" writer. I think all you
mention above is what makes DS9 so rich and layered. But we all have our
point of view........:oD
> And many had been watching both shows all along, just as many Voyager
> viewers had also been watching DS9. There was a competition in terms
> of exclusive fanbases who attacked each other's shows, but Star Trek
> fans were disappointed by both shows and DS9 and Voyager fans still
> seemed to watch each other's shows...if only to attack them.
But how do you explain the fact that DS9's ratings were much higher than
Voyager's? I mean during the time when both shows were on and when DS9
went off the air the fans didn't migrate to Voyager?
>> Some
>> people didn't like DS9 because it wasn't an action show.
>
> DS9 had no shortage of action. DS9 had two wars and endless amounts of
> battle scenes ranging into the downright gruesome. I particularly
> could have done without the scene of a Jem'Haddar snapping a
> Cardassian's back over his knee.
DS9 was more character driven than action driven but it did have that
too. It wasn't for kids either.
>> They explored
>> cultures (Klingon, Cardassian, Bajoran, Ferengi, Trill, and so on).
>
> Well they explored the Bajorans in the earlier seasons until the
> audience got bored, eventually they brought back the Bajorans as pawns
> in a ridiculous Book of Revelations style plot.
For some this was good. Not all of us are atheists or agnostics. I am
agnostic however and still enjoy "religious" subject matter. But I know
a lot of Christians who (some are on this ng) loved DS9 precisely because
people of faith were not ridiculed on the show. Ok, they made fun of the
Ferengi but that's another matter. Moreover, agnostics and atheists
could still enjoy the show because humans were shown to be neutral in the
matter (except for Sisko).
>> They
>> explored and developed the villains (the Founders, the Pah-Wraiths).
>
> We knew something about The Founders, we really knew nothing about the
> Pah Wraiths. Rosalind Chao turned in a great performance as a possesed
> Keiko but the producers decided that it would be much more terrifying
> if the people had red contact lenses and talked like the Exorcist. We
> never learned much about the Pah Wraiths except that they were evil in
> the most cliched sense, mainly because we were told it over and over
> again. We never learned much about the Prophets over and over again,
> except that they were good and we were told this over and over again
> too. There was no real proof of it though either.
The Pah Wraith cult followers were pretty clear on what they believed.
And at the end, we know that Dukat (possesed) when he was fighting with
Sisko had plans to burn the Alpha Quadrant from end to end. It was
"cliched" I agree but it was also very archetypal as well. I loved how
they blended a variety of religious and social beliefs into the show.
The way they had the Ferengi women undressed.....lol being the opposite
of Muslims today. Like I said, there are so many layers and facets to
DS9 that we could discuss this for a very long time.
You have to also consider that it being a character driven show, there
were lots of reasons to watch DS9 other than what you object to. Some
people loved Garak, some Quark and so on. Some liked the relationships.
It all depends what you were watching it for. I liked the politics, the
religious stuff, the relationships, the cultures and finally the
characters. Just look at the list of guest characters for any of the eps
(go to Startrek.com and look for library and DS9). It is amazing how
many people were on that show. It's a rich, well-written saga no matter
what anyone says. If you take bits and parts of it, yes, you'll find
flaws. Nothing is perfect but if you look at the whole series, it was
fantastic.
>> They explored relationships between the cultures and people. They
>> didn't explore the new ridged forehead villain or new space anomaly
>> of the week.
>
> Yes aside from the Dominion, DS9 mainly imported TNG races like the
> Cardassians, Bajorans and Klingons and Ferengi and continued their
> storylines. DS9 was pretty bad at producing any original races.
They didn't have too. Look at Voyager and see how boring it was to add
new and certainly not improved ridge-headed aliens each week. No, they
took the mythology that was there and gave it DEPTH. The Cardassians,
Bajorans, Ferengi were not the same on DS9 as they were on TNG. Why
invent new races? Why not deal with the ones there and have them grow.
You can't deny that they developed these cultures well. Even the
Klingons were well done here. Look at Kor, Koloth and Kang from TOS.
Why invent new Klingons when the backstory to these great characters was
there to explore? Voyager had the new aliens, did you like them? In
addition, there were other races as well as these that were developed.
>> The villains were equal in power to the good guys. Look at how the
>> once, creepy, scary Borg were wimped down on Voyager. DS9 fans just
>> didn't take to Voyager very well and so did not watch it when DS9
>> ended.
>
> Yes and look how Dukat was turned from an interesting charachter into
> a rambling lunatic against the best efforts of Alaimo, while Ira Behr
> helpfully explained that anyone who objected to this move liked Nazis.
I've never heard that before... Anyhow, it is a pity that Dukat wasn't
made more scary and dangerous, yes. But sometimes there is just so much
time to do things. I really didn't like the fight at the end with Sisko
and felt cheated but I don't look at DS9 that way. I look at all of it.
Moments that were priceless. Little things like where Garak is talking
to Quark in the bar and talks about how the Federation is like rootbeer
all sweet and cloying....heh or when Sisko punched Q and said he wasn't
Picard. I know if I try I'll remember moments for TNG and TOS too.
Can't say the same for Voyager. But for DS9, the moments are too long to
list....heh.
>> Yes and it's early yet. I think it has a lot of potential but after
>> 35+ years I don't expect perfect originality. But as a Niner, I am
>> looking more for how the characters and cultures are developed. I
>> also like the odd sci-fi-like eps like TNG's "Cause and Effect" or
>> "Parallels". I enjoy that type of ep too. I see this in Enterprise.
>> Not at the quality level of DS9 but it's there. It wasn't in
>> Voyager.
>
> Well we might see by Season 3 if Enterprise is really going anywhere
> or not. Theproblem is most viewers aren't patient enough to wait
> around that long.
Very true... It's not like it was for TNG. You can say the above for
DS9, Voyager and especially Enterprise. Things aren't like they used to
be.
> Season 7 was weak, Season 6 was a lot stronger. Ryan's addition was
> unfortunate and aside from One and Dark Frontier, she was mostly
> wasted screen time. But for whatever reason you watched, so did quite
> a few other people. I tuned in to Ds9's final season even it was
> borderline unwatchable and I hated the show by that point. Watching
> Star Trek may be a hard habit to break...
I was mesmerized by the last season of DS9. To each his own I guess.
> Futurama has essentially been cancelled and its ratings were never
> that great to begin with. The Simpsons was\is a pop culture phenomenon
> and will be watched till doomsday. But then both shows were also in
> good time slots on a major network and were well promoted. Even on
> UPN, Voyager and Enterprise don't reach many parts of the country and
> the promotion is rather poor.
The same can be said for DS9. It may have been syndicated but it wasn't
on at good hours for the most part and it wasn't promoted very much.
Voyager was very well promoted but had other problems like being on a
small network. Can't say the same for TNG.
>> >Both shows had a roughly equal ratio of
>> > bad to good episodes, as did TNG and TOS for that matter. Most Trek
>> > series fall into that same pattern.
>>
>> I disagree. Even DS9's worst shows were ten times better than
>> Voyager.
>
> Really? Time's Orphan? If Wishes Were Horses? Take Me Out to the
> Holosuite? Move Along Home? The Reckoning?
Granted there were some not so good eps but DS9 overall had much more
interesting eps than the others. Thing is even with the worst ones,
aspects of the ep were carried on to later eps. The story grew and
developed along the way. It's a matter of taste too. Lots of people
don't like the Ferengi eps. I loved them and I said why before. But
when the eps were good they were the BEST. Think: "In a Pale
Moonlight", "Way of the Warrior I and II", "Past Tense I and II" and so
many, many more too long to list here. I can't say that for the other
shows not even TNG.
> Some were well developed and well acted, some weren't. Garak was well
> acted, Ziyal 3 had some of the worst acting I've ever seen on
> television. The actors playing Leeta and Nog were quite poor. And
> Terry Farrel was rather mediocre.
I disagree wholeheartedly with this but to each his own and considering
the cornucopia of actors on DS9 your picks above are negligible. But for
arguments sake: Ziyal 3 could have been better, true. Leeta was
wonderful. Nog was great. Terry Farell, well, I liked the character
so...
>> Anyhow, it's all a matter of taste. I liked how DS9 poked fun at
>> the excesses of Capitalism and how it approached religion and war.
>> They were serious at times (like the ep where Keiko has a run-in with
>> Vedek Winn paralleling the Creationist/Theory of Evolution
>> controversy in the States.
>
> Yes that was back when DS9 seemed ready to question Bajoran religion
> as opposed to the later seasons, when it was adopted as the one true
> faith superseding Starfleet and Sisko began taking his orders from the
> 'Prophets' It was a long road from Kirk teling Apollo to go to hell
> and Picard telling Q to do the same to DS9 endorsing the worship of
> powerful aliens.
But Sisko was the only one doing that along with Kira and the Bajorans.
The Prophets were seen as aliens by everyone else. What about Starfleet,
the Klingons and the Romulans in the war? Your focusing on one aspect
only.
> Undoubtedly. Berman was setting his sights on bringing Enterprise to
> screen but that's looking less likely. Any non-TNG film would now
> involve a new cast, perhaps with one or two celebrity Trekkers making
> an apperance.
It's to wait and see. But if they go with Voyager skipping over DS9,
that's it for me........heh.
Well this is a good discussion. I can see that we don't agree on too
many things but that's the way it should be otherwise it wouldn't be a
good debate.........:oD
Take care,
Gisele
Gisele La Roche
DS9. You make some very good points and prove them. It's just that I
think we approach the show in a different manner and have a different point
of view of it. You seem to focus on specific things whereas I look at the
whole story. What appealed to me may not have appealed to you like the
focus towards the end on politics, the war and religion.
Thanks for a good discussion!
Gisele
Maureen Goldman
>>Maureen Goldman inksl...@FOGsunshine.net wrote:
>>If the hero is an alien, then the show is sci-fi.
> kebe...@aol.comeover (asdf) wrote:
>So Alf is then sci-fi? Mork and Mindy is then a sci-fi show? Third Rock from
>the Sun is sci-fi then, right? They are not sci-fi, they are situational
>comedies, or sitcoms for short.
A work of fiction can fall under more than one category. Horror is an
example - it can be science fiction, fantasy, or just plain nasty
stuff as per the daily paper. There's "Galaxy Quest", with a whole
buncha genres rolled into one - SF, comedy, action.
>Lois and Clark, Batman, Smallville, and others of their ilk are not sci-fi,
>they are a part of a separate genre called "superheroes."
>They're apples and oranges. Just because the hero comes from another planet
>does not necessarily mean the show is sci-fi.
Batman is a local with no particular powers, so he doesn't fall under
the category of science fiction (his gadgetry may, however). I've no
problem with a "superhero" subcategory... Superman and The Tick, yep.
O Deus
> > Outside of
> > genre SF fans, SF shows don't really compete against each other
> > anymore than Law and Order competes with CSI or ER competes with
> > Presidio Med. They're just similarly themed shows.
>
> You are kidding. Have you ever been to a Star Wars vs Star Trek board or
> a Farscape vs Enterprise or any combination thereof? You don't see that
> for any other genre except sci-fi and fantasy. Fans of sci-fi are very
> outspoken and usually very loyal to "their" respective shows.
Yes which is why I said that outside of genre SF fans, SF shows don't
really compete with each other with mainstream viewers. SF fans are
indeed very competitive, but the general public doesn't have those
loyalties or care. Nor do they have a quota of how many SF shows
they'll watch, it's a question of whether the show catches their
interest or not.
> > Saturation really isn't the problem that people make it out to be. But
> > the fact that Star Trek is the butt of jokes with mainstream audiences
> > and is viewed with contempt by genre fans is a problem. But this is
> > caused by a variety of factors.
>
> So are Star Wars fans.......heh. As for the joking, that's usually a
> good sign. Contempt on the other hand is not. Oh well...
Not really. Consider the news stories on Star Wars fans standing on
line for a month to wait for Phantom Menace vs. the news stories
involving Star Trek fans. The former were treated credibly, the latter
are usually treated as freaks even when the report itself is positive.
Star Trek is not viewed as trendy by SF fans anymore and is treated
with contempt and to mainstream audiences, Star Trek fans have come to
represent a set of stereotypes best expressed in Shatner's infamous
Saturday Night Live opening skit.
> > DS9 and Voyager pulled in ratings that weren't that far apart when you
> > compensate for the fact that Voyager was a network series and DS9 was
> > in syndication and its figures were calculated differently. And
> > competition has become fiercer for all shows and TV ratings in general
> > have declined, but nevertheless shows can still be succesfull. DS9 and
> > Voyager were not obscure shows that had to be discovered, their pilot
> > ratings clearly testify that the TNG audience tuned in to them and
> > then tuned out again. That's not merely a question of competition, but
> > an audience sampling those shows and deciding not to watch anymore.
>
> True but Voyager was promoted "heavily" by Paramount. DS9 did not get
> that much promotion.
DS9 had a tie in episode with TNG, it had a DS9 cast member making an
apperance on a TNG episode, it had a TNG cast member and two recurring
TNG charachters in its cast. Patrick Stewart appeared in DS9's pilot.
Paramount made a very strong effort to tie in the two series. Even in
season 4, DS9 still landed a TV Guide cover. Eventually Paramount did
give up on DS9 attracting new viewers but promotion is not really that
meaningfull anyway, thus far it hasn't done anything for Voyager or
Enterprise.
> Still, I understand what you're saying but you have
> to look at things "overall". When you isolate the parts of the argument,
> it doesn't hold as well. I agree that DS9 and Voyager did not have the
> viewership they had on TNG but there are other factors involved which I
> won't repeat. Also, fans weren't as ready to give the new shows a chance
> other than the hardcore Trek fans. If TNG were to come on TV now,
> especially with the first few seasons as they were, I doubt it would get
> the same following. Fans back then wanted a new Trek show. I don't
> think they were ready for DS9 or even Voyager. Many were loyal to TNG.
> The fracturing of the fan base was already there when DS9 came on.
Yes TNG wouldn't do quite as well today, but it would do well. After
all TNG was widely attacked by Star Trek fans when it first aired too.
And some of the factors you cite for TNG's success are correct, but
all those issues still overlook the reality that people liked TNG and
they still like it today. On a basic level TNG works, in a way that
the later spinoffs don't. It came closest to recreating TOS's iconic
charachters, the simple open ended appeal of its premise and the awe
and wonder of space. TNG was created by Gene Roddenberry and not Rick
Berman. And some element of TOS's creative success came with it.
> > And many had been watching both shows all along, just as many Voyager
> > viewers had also been watching DS9. There was a competition in terms
> > of exclusive fanbases who attacked each other's shows, but Star Trek
> > fans were disappointed by both shows and DS9 and Voyager fans still
> > seemed to watch each other's shows...if only to attack them.
>
> But how do you explain the fact that DS9's ratings were much higher than
> Voyager's? I mean during the time when both shows were on and when DS9
> went off the air the fans didn't migrate to Voyager?
The ratings for the two shows weren't all that far apart. Based on
Star Trek News's archived ratings
http://www.geocities.com/Hollywood/6952/ratings.htm Voyager may at
times have actually been pulling in more viewers.
For instance both Scoprion II and A Time To Stand were the season
openers for the fall of 97. Stand pulled in under 5 and a half million
viewers, Scorpion II pulled in over 10 million. The ratings do draw
closer together later on in the season but Voyager is still ahead.
They go on to change more significantly later on because DS9 was in
its sixth season and had lost about as many viewers as it was going to
lose and hit its ground floor, while Voyager was still in its fourth
season and had more viewers to lose.
> >> They explored
> >> cultures (Klingon, Cardassian, Bajoran, Ferengi, Trill, and so on).
> >
> > Well they explored the Bajorans in the earlier seasons until the
> > audience got bored, eventually they brought back the Bajorans as pawns
> > in a ridiculous Book of Revelations style plot.
>
> For some this was good. Not all of us are atheists or agnostics. I am
> agnostic however and still enjoy "religious" subject matter. But I know
> a lot of Christians who (some are on this ng) loved DS9 precisely because
> people of faith were not ridiculed on the show.
There's nothing necesarilly wrong with religious subject matter. In
The Hands of the Prophets and even some lesser episodes did it right,
on the other hand nonesense like The Rapture or The Reckoning where
red contact lens demons posses people and talk like outakes from The
Excorcist was just plain embarassing. Ditto for horror movie cliches
like the book that's activated by blood.
The difference is that Hands of the Prophets had something to say
about religion, The Reckoning was just drivel no different than the
Left Behind series. It wasn't even religious. It was just bad horror
cliches using Bajoran religion as backstory.
> >> They
> >> explored and developed the villains (the Founders, the Pah-Wraiths).
> >
> > We knew something about The Founders, we really knew nothing about the
> > Pah Wraiths. Rosalind Chao turned in a great performance as a possesed
> > Keiko but the producers decided that it would be much more terrifying
> > if the people had red contact lenses and talked like the Exorcist. We
> > never learned much about the Pah Wraiths except that they were evil in
> > the most cliched sense, mainly because we were told it over and over
> > again. We never learned much about the Prophets over and over again,
> > except that they were good and we were told this over and over again
> > too. There was no real proof of it though either.
>
> The Pah Wraith cult followers were pretty clear on what they believed.
Yes but we don't know much of anything about the Pah Wraiths
themselves who remained undeveloped.
> And at the end, we know that Dukat (possesed) when he was fighting with
> Sisko had plans to burn the Alpha Quadrant from end to end. It was
> "cliched" I agree but it was also very archetypal as well.
It made no real sense. The DS9 pilot was brillant precisely because it
had Sisko trying to communicate with a very alien form of life.
Towards the end though the Wormhole Aliens apparently knew everything,
were tampering with Earth decades before and had seemingly unlimited
powers.
> I loved how
> they blended a variety of religious and social beliefs into the show.
> The way they had the Ferengi women undressed.....lol being the opposite
> of Muslims today. Like I said, there are so many layers and facets to
> DS9 that we could discuss this for a very long time.
Actually that was TNG which revealed that in the first Ferengi
episode.
> You have to also consider that it being a character driven show, there
> were lots of reasons to watch DS9 other than what you object to. Some
> people loved Garak, some Quark and so on. Some liked the relationships.
> It all depends what you were watching it for. I liked the politics, the
> religious stuff, the relationships, the cultures and finally the
> characters. Just look at the list of guest characters for any of the eps
> (go to Startrek.com and look for library and DS9). It is amazing how
> many people were on that show. It's a rich, well-written saga no matter
> what anyone says. If you take bits and parts of it, yes, you'll find
> flaws. Nothing is perfect but if you look at the whole series, it was
> fantastic.
A series consists of its parts, a series which has an arc that
redefines what came before it is going to be seriously affected when
the culmination of that arc is as ridiculous as DS9's final episodes.
DS9 had plenty of good sides, so did Voyager, so does Enterprise. But
all three also had glaring flaws that seriously affected its content.
> >> They explored relationships between the cultures and people. They
> >> didn't explore the new ridged forehead villain or new space anomaly
> >> of the week.
> >
> > Yes aside from the Dominion, DS9 mainly imported TNG races like the
> > Cardassians, Bajorans and Klingons and Ferengi and continued their
> > storylines. DS9 was pretty bad at producing any original races.
>
> They didn't have too. Look at Voyager and see how boring it was to add
> new and certainly not improved ridge-headed aliens each week. No, they
> took the mythology that was there and gave it DEPTH. The Cardassians,
> Bajorans, Ferengi were not the same on DS9 as they were on TNG. Why
> invent new races? Why not deal with the ones there and have them grow.
> You can't deny that they developed these cultures well.
There's nothing wrong with working with TNG races, but it does
demonstrate a lack of originality and creativity. Voyager may have
screwed up often, but at least aside from the Borg, it made the
effort. DS9 seemed content to rewrite the TNG universe. In the cases
of the Cardassians and Bajorans they did do a good job of working with
the TNG races, in the cases of the Klingons and Ferengi they just
turned them into more extreme caricatures than TNG had.
> Even the
> Klingons were well done here. Look at Kor, Koloth and Kang from TOS.
> Why invent new Klingons when the backstory to these great characters was
> there to explore?
Yes that was one good episode. But the Klingon season featured no
shortage of bad ones. Witness the search for Kahless' sword. Way of
the Warrior for that matter and many other Klingon episodes reduced
them to two dimensional growlers who occasionally mentionm, 'Honor.'
There was no new ground broken here with the Klingons aside from Dax 2
telling Worf in Tacking Into the Wind that the Klingon government had
long been corrupted, but that wasn't developed or followed up on.
> Voyager had the new aliens, did you like them?
The Vidians were quite disturbing and menancing. Even the Kazon had
their moments. More to the point Voyager could do the kind of strong
stand alone episodes dealing with new alien races that DS9 had lost
the ability to do after Season 5, like Distant Origin and Living
Witness.
> >> The villains were equal in power to the good guys. Look at how the
> >> once, creepy, scary Borg were wimped down on Voyager. DS9 fans just
> >> didn't take to Voyager very well and so did not watch it when DS9
> >> ended.
> >
> > Yes and look how Dukat was turned from an interesting charachter into
> > a rambling lunatic against the best efforts of Alaimo, while Ira Behr
> > helpfully explained that anyone who objected to this move liked Nazis.
>
> I've never heard that before... Anyhow, it is a pity that Dukat wasn't
> made more scary and dangerous, yes.
Actually the problem was that like Garak, Dukat worked as a charachter
because he was somewhat sympathic and a bit ambivalent. And Behr, who
had the writing ability of a lobotomized Baywatch producer, never got
that and threw it all away in favor of a cliched nemesis for Sisko and
a showdown ripped from Star Wars Return of the Jedi.
> >> Yes and it's early yet. I think it has a lot of potential but after
> >> 35+ years I don't expect perfect originality. But as a Niner, I am
> >> looking more for how the characters and cultures are developed. I
> >> also like the odd sci-fi-like eps like TNG's "Cause and Effect" or
> >> "Parallels". I enjoy that type of ep too. I see this in Enterprise.
> >> Not at the quality level of DS9 but it's there. It wasn't in
> >> Voyager.
> >
> > Well we might see by Season 3 if Enterprise is really going anywhere
> > or not. Theproblem is most viewers aren't patient enough to wait
> > around that long.
>
> Very true... It's not like it was for TNG. You can say the above for
> DS9, Voyager and especially Enterprise. Things aren't like they used to
> be.
Each failed series has in turn made it more difficult for the next one
to maintain credibility, attract viewers and hold on to them. That's
where we are now.
> >> >Both shows had a roughly equal ratio of
> >> > bad to good episodes, as did TNG and TOS for that matter. Most Trek
> >> > series fall into that same pattern.
> >>
> >> I disagree. Even DS9's worst shows were ten times better than
> >> Voyager.
> >
> > Really? Time's Orphan? If Wishes Were Horses? Take Me Out to the
> > Holosuite? Move Along Home? The Reckoning?
>
> Granted there were some not so good eps but DS9 overall had much more
> interesting eps than the others. Thing is even with the worst ones,
> aspects of the ep were carried on to later eps. The story grew and
> developed along the way. It's a matter of taste too. Lots of people
> don't like the Ferengi eps. I loved them and I said why before. But
> when the eps were good they were the BEST. Think: "In a Pale
> Moonlight", "Way of the Warrior I and II", "Past Tense I and II" and so
> many, many more too long to list here. I can't say that for the other
> shows not even TNG.
Well we clearly have different tastes. e.g. I tend to think that Way
of the Warrior was an action show with a handfull of good charachter
moments drowned in ridiculous action scenes (why the hell do the
Klingons keep drawing bladed weapons instead of using their disruptors
anyway?)
> >> Anyhow, it's all a matter of taste. I liked how DS9 poked fun at
> >> the excesses of Capitalism and how it approached religion and war.
> >> They were serious at times (like the ep where Keiko has a run-in with
> >> Vedek Winn paralleling the Creationist/Theory of Evolution
> >> controversy in the States.
> >
> > Yes that was back when DS9 seemed ready to question Bajoran religion
> > as opposed to the later seasons, when it was adopted as the one true
> > faith superseding Starfleet and Sisko began taking his orders from the
> > 'Prophets' It was a long road from Kirk teling Apollo to go to hell
> > and Picard telling Q to do the same to DS9 endorsing the worship of
> > powerful aliens.
>
> But Sisko was the only one doing that along with Kira and the Bajorans.
> The Prophets were seen as aliens by everyone else. What about Starfleet,
> the Klingons and the Romulans in the war? Your focusing on one aspect
> only.
Not by Dax who prayed to them before being killed by Dukat (typical
scenario of a non-believing charachter accepting Jesus and being
redeemed before being killed as punishment for prior non-belief.)
Starfleet's role in DS9 had been significantly eroded and they only
existed in a military capacity during the war, which isn't very
interesting. Starfleet is much more than just a war machine. The
Klingons remained their usual cliches, aside from the embarassing
moments involved in Alexander's return to Star Trek. The Romulans were
intriguing prior to the Dominion War, their actual participation
seemed highlighted in a weak Cuban Missile Crisis retread and not much
else.
Gisele La Roche
> Yes which is why I said that outside of genre SF fans, SF shows don't
> really compete with each other with mainstream viewers. SF fans are
> indeed very competitive, but the general public doesn't have those
> loyalties or care. Nor do they have a quota of how many SF shows
> they'll watch, it's a question of whether the show catches their
> interest or not.
Ok, I misunderstood what you said but I don't really get this point.
I've lost the gist of it.
>> > Saturation really isn't the problem that people make it out to be.
With a smaller audience (sci-fi fans) when sci-fi is saturated, it does
have an effect.
> Not really. Consider the news stories on Star Wars fans standing on
> line for a month to wait for Phantom Menace vs. the news stories
> involving Star Trek fans. The former were treated credibly,
NO way, Conan for instance had a sequence that made Star Wars fans look
even worse than Star Trek fans. They really made fun of the fans and it
was really funny.
>the latter
> are usually treated as freaks even when the report itself is positive.
So are Star Wars and sports fans... Of course they didn't have such
things as "Trekkies" the movie. I hate that film.......grrrrrrr.
> Star Trek is not viewed as trendy by SF fans anymore and is treated
> with contempt and to mainstream audiences, Star Trek fans have come to
> represent a set of stereotypes best expressed in Shatner's infamous
> Saturday Night Live opening skit.
I think that's been there for a long time way before Enterprise.
> Yes TNG wouldn't do quite as well today, but it would do well.
I disagree especially when you consider the first few seasons.
>After
> all TNG was widely attacked by Star Trek fans when it first aired too.
> And some of the factors you cite for TNG's success are correct, but
> all those issues still overlook the reality that people liked TNG and
> they still like it today.
Nemesis says otherwise...
>> But how do you explain the fact that DS9's ratings were much higher
>> than Voyager's? I mean during the time when both shows were on and
>> when DS9 went off the air the fans didn't migrate to Voyager?
>
> The ratings for the two shows weren't all that far apart. Based on
> Star Trek News's archived ratings
> http://www.geocities.com/Hollywood/6952/ratings.htm Voyager may at
> times have actually been pulling in more viewers.
>
> For instance both Scoprion II and A Time To Stand were the season
> openers for the fall of 97. Stand pulled in under 5 and a half million
> viewers, Scorpion II pulled in over 10 million. The ratings do draw
> closer together later on in the season but Voyager is still ahead.
> They go on to change more significantly later on because DS9 was in
> its sixth season and had lost about as many viewers as it was going to
> lose and hit its ground floor, while Voyager was still in its fourth
> season and had more viewers to lose.
DS9 still had higher viewership "overall". Voyager spiked here and
there, yes.
> There's nothing necesarilly wrong with religious subject matter. In
> The Hands of the Prophets and even some lesser episodes did it right,
> on the other hand nonesense like The Rapture or The Reckoning where
> red contact lens demons posses people and talk like outakes from The
> Excorcist was just plain embarassing. Ditto for horror movie cliches
> like the book that's activated by blood.
>
> The difference is that Hands of the Prophets had something to say
> about religion, The Reckoning was just drivel no different than the
> Left Behind series. It wasn't even religious. It was just bad horror
> cliches using Bajoran religion as backstory.
Well, again we don't see things the same way...oh well.
>> The Pah Wraith cult followers were pretty clear on what they
>> believed.
>
> Yes but we don't know much of anything about the Pah Wraiths
> themselves who remained undeveloped.
Agreed but I think with all the cast they had already (main and
recurring) they had enough to do with the characters that people wanted
to see.
>> And at the end, we know that Dukat (possesed) when he was fighting
>> with Sisko had plans to burn the Alpha Quadrant from end to end. It
>> was "cliched" I agree but it was also very archetypal as well.
>
> It made no real sense. The DS9 pilot was brillant precisely because it
> had Sisko trying to communicate with a very alien form of life.
> Towards the end though the Wormhole Aliens apparently knew everything,
> were tampering with Earth decades before and had seemingly unlimited
> powers.
The Raelians would love this series.......heh. Anyway, I liked this. I
wasn't focused on this as much as I was on other aspects of the series.
I've already talked about this. But I didn't have a problem with this.
They and the Pah Wraiths could have been better developed, I agree.
>> I loved how
>> they blended a variety of religious and social beliefs into the show.
>> The way they had the Ferengi women undressed.....lol being the
>> opposite of Muslims today. Like I said, there are so many layers and
>> facets to DS9 that we could discuss this for a very long time.
>
> Actually that was TNG which revealed that in the first Ferengi
> episode.
But in DS9, we had Moogie who fought against it. It became an issue we
could identify with. On TNG it was a characteristic that was tacked on.
>> You have to also consider that it being a character driven show,
>> there were lots of reasons to watch DS9 other than what you object
>> to. Some people loved Garak, some Quark and so on. Some liked the
>> relationships. It all depends what you were watching it for. I
>> liked the politics, the religious stuff, the relationships, the
>> cultures and finally the characters. Just look at the list of guest
>> characters for any of the eps (go to Startrek.com and look for
>> library and DS9). It is amazing how many people were on that show.
>> It's a rich, well-written saga no matter what anyone says. If you
>> take bits and parts of it, yes, you'll find flaws. Nothing is
>> perfect but if you look at the whole series, it was fantastic.
>
> A series consists of its parts, a series which has an arc that
> redefines what came before it is going to be seriously affected when
> the culmination of that arc is as ridiculous as DS9's final episodes.
> DS9 had plenty of good sides, so did Voyager, so does Enterprise. But
> all three also had glaring flaws that seriously affected its content.
Again, I disagree. I found the final episodes riveting and awesome but
then I wasn't watching the same way you were I think. You wanted
something more realistic. I was looking at what I said in the paragraph
above. I liked how Rom and the Ferengi became more liberal and open-
minded for instance. I liked how the war ended. It could have been
longer but then again, this was the last show. The only things I didn't
like were 1. the fight with Sisko and Dukat which was way too short. I
wish they had made Dukat really scary here. 2. The memories of Worf and
how he didn't remember Jadzia. That really affected that part of the
show and that's it. I liked how everything else worked out. I think it
could have been fleshed out better in the sense that they could have used
a few more eps to really do a good job. I agree with what you're saying
but these things didn't bother me. I could add the detail for myself. I
didn't need to see it done on screen.
>> They didn't have too. Look at Voyager and see how boring it was to
>> add new and certainly not improved ridge-headed aliens each week.
>> No, they took the mythology that was there and gave it DEPTH. The
>> Cardassians, Bajorans, Ferengi were not the same on DS9 as they were
>> on TNG. Why invent new races? Why not deal with the ones there and
>> have them grow. You can't deny that they developed these cultures
>> well.
>
> There's nothing wrong with working with TNG races, but it does
> demonstrate a lack of originality and creativity.
I disagree considering what they did with them. DS9 fleshed out the Star
Trek universe and even the mirror universe. Why create even more
cultures? I think that was one of the problems with Voyager. We already
had too many cultures and new ones were just weak rehashes of the old.
If anything, Voyager destroyed some like the Borg and the Q. They did
have Species 8472 but they were dumbed down very quickly.
>Voyager may have
> screwed up often, but at least aside from the Borg, it made the
> effort. DS9 seemed content to rewrite the TNG universe.
Not rewrite, expand and explore it. It wasn't a show where there was a
ship to explore the galaxy. It was a space station which was the perfect
opportunity to have recurring characters and villains. It was the
perfect time to explore the Star Trek cultures and characters. It was a
character driven show.
>In the cases
> of the Cardassians and Bajorans they did do a good job of working with
> the TNG races, in the cases of the Klingons and Ferengi they just
> turned them into more extreme caricatures than TNG had.
I disagree so much. The Klingons were fleshed out so well here. I was
so surprised when they killed off Gowron. The Ferengi were used so well
to satirize Capitalism, religion and social mores. DS9 was supposed to
deal with the cultures that were there to begin with. It was a space
station not a ship of exploration. It took advantage of this and fleshed
out characters and even secondary characters excellently. It also
developed all the cultures I mentioned.
>> Even the
>> Klingons were well done here. Look at Kor, Koloth and Kang from TOS.
>> Why invent new Klingons when the backstory to these great characters
>> was there to explore?
>
> Yes that was one good episode. But the Klingon season featured no
> shortage of bad ones. Witness the search for Kahless' sword. Way of
> the Warrior for that matter and many other Klingon episodes reduced
> them to two dimensional growlers who occasionally mentionm, 'Honor.'
> There was no new ground broken here with the Klingons aside from Dax 2
> telling Worf in Tacking Into the Wind that the Klingon government had
> long been corrupted, but that wasn't developed or followed up on.
Well I saw other things in these episodes. I liked the one with Kor. It
showed how Klingons valued pride as much as honor. As for being growlers
I don't see that. I thought that way about them in TNG. How about
Martok and Gowron? How about Kor, Koloth and Kang?
>> Voyager had the new aliens, did you like them?
>
> The Vidians were quite disturbing and menancing. Even the Kazon had
> their moments. More to the point Voyager could do the kind of strong
> stand alone episodes dealing with new alien races that DS9 had lost
> the ability to do after Season 5, like Distant Origin and Living
> Witness.
The Vidians were good. They did have the odd good episode and it was a
lot easier to do those kinds of eps on Voyager, I agree. But the focus
was very different there. They couldn't help but discover new races but
in the end they were boring and rehashes of what we'd already seen so
many times before, especially on TNG and TOS except for the one or two
like the above.
> Actually the problem was that like Garak, Dukat worked as a charachter
> because he was somewhat sympathic and a bit ambivalent. And Behr, who
> had the writing ability of a lobotomized Baywatch producer, never got
> that and threw it all away in favor of a cliched nemesis for Sisko and
> a showdown ripped from Star Wars Return of the Jedi.
Ok, I see what you mean. I still think however that it was a good idea
but it wasn't well developed. I think if Dukat had been made more
dangerous and scary it would have worked better. As it was, it did
diminish his character, yes.
> Each failed series has in turn made it more difficult for the next one
> to maintain credibility, attract viewers and hold on to them. That's
> where we are now.
I don't think DS9 failed at all. You are so negative. I am sorry you
don't like DS9. I suspect you like Voyager? Anyway, what you say above
is applicable to all TV. It's just not the same anymore. Seems like
simple stuff attracts viewers now. They like doctor shows, lawyer shows
with easily identifyable characters and situations. They like reality
shows like the Survivor series or Jerry Springer. It's not the same now
and it wasn't at the time DS9 was on the air.
DS9 did not fail, sorry. It did as well as any other sci-fi show at the
time and there were plenty. I think the only sci-fi/horror show really
doing well was X-Files. DS9 held its own. Voyager on the other hand
just survived and even with Jeri Ryan, didn't get any better ratings than
DS9.
> Well we clearly have different tastes. e.g. I tend to think that Way
> of the Warrior was an action show with a handfull of good charachter
> moments drowned in ridiculous action scenes (why the hell do the
> Klingons keep drawing bladed weapons instead of using their disruptors
> anyway?)
Because they like to fight. It's too easy and too fast with disruptors.
Geez, you don't know the Klingons very well do you.
>> But Sisko was the only one doing that along with Kira and the
>> Bajorans. The Prophets were seen as aliens by everyone else. What
>> about Starfleet, the Klingons and the Romulans in the war? Your
>> focusing on one aspect only.
>
> Not by Dax who prayed to them before being killed by Dukat (typical
> scenario of a non-believing charachter accepting Jesus and being
> redeemed before being killed as punishment for prior non-belief.)
Lol, remember I am agnostic. On my desk I have a Buddha (Hindu who
guides you in the next life), Buddha (Smiling Chinese who gives you good
luck) Ganeshe (Hindu elephant god who removes obstacles and is good luck)
and a Virgin Mary. I figure I'd give them all a chance, you never know.
It's the way agnostics think. We think everything is possible and
nothing is provable. There's something good in all religions but none of
them are able to prove the existence of god or gods. There may or may
not be a god but there's more to life than we can ever know. I thought
Jadzia was giving it a chance. The Prophets had been shown to be
"powerful" aliens so... Of course what you say above is also a
possibility. That's the beauty of DS9. You could get all sorts of
archetypes from it. It all depended on what resonated with you.
> Starfleet's role in DS9 had been significantly eroded and they only
> existed in a military capacity during the war, which isn't very
> interesting. Starfleet is much more than just a war machine.
We had Section 31 which added a new dimension to the Federation. As to
Starfleet what more did they have in TNG let's say than they had here?
Starfleet has never been focused on before that much either.
>The
> Klingons remained their usual cliches, aside from the embarassing
> moments involved in Alexander's return to Star Trek.
Yeah I didn't like that one. I didn't like the actor....heh. I thought
the Klingons were fleshed out very well in DS9. I liked the characters
of Gowron, Martok and Worf. I liked how they had the tip of the hat to
TOS (more than once "Trials and Tribble-ations) when they brought in Kor,
Koloth and Kang.
>The Romulans were
> intriguing prior to the Dominion War, their actual participation
> seemed highlighted in a weak Cuban Missile Crisis retread and not much
> else.
I wish they had done more with them <sigh> too. Anyway, it makes me sad
that you hated DS9. I love it.
Gisele
Boris Badenov
|So Alf is then sci-fi? Mork and Mindy is then a sci-fi show? Third Rock from
|the Sun is sci-fi then, right? They are not sci-fi, they are situational
|comedies, or sitcoms for short.
|Lois and Clark, Batman, Smallville, and others of their ilk are not sci-fi,
|they are a part of a separate genre called "superheroes."
|They're apples and oranges. Just because the hero comes from another planet
|does not necessarily mean the show is sci-fi.
SF is a much bigger umbrella than your taxonomy allows. For evidence, I invite you to
subscribe to the Science Fiction Book Club, and note what they offer their subscribers as
science fiction. In subjective discussion about artistic work, ultimately, all of us
decide for outselves what is and is not science fiction. I tend to consider superhero
shtick a subgenre of SF, not a separate genre of its own. I do, however, consider fantasy
to be a separate genre. Arbitrary? Yes, Subjective? Yes. No more [or less] so than
your statements, however.
____
Faith is about believing in something, and letting it change you ..
You don't fix faith; faith fixes you. -- Book, Firefly
asdf
> Arbitrary? Yes, Subjective? Yes. No more [or less] so than
>your statements, however.
Indeed... though at the end of the day the clerks at Blockbuster, West Coast
Video, et al. have to make taxonomic decisions so the majority of their
potential customers can find the videos they are looking for.
Using conventional wisdom the Tick and Alf go into comedy, Superman and
Smallville go into superheroes, LotR and Xena go into fantasy, Star Trek and B5
go into sci-fi. And that's just the way it is... taxonomically, and
economically, speaking.
Boris Badenov
|Nitpick: The Internet did too exist when TNG started - it just wasn't
|the big commercialized thing it is today. Usenet was something totally
|different from the Internet and AOL was a glorified BBS and not
|connected to the Internet. I first got connected to the 'Net in 1989
|when started university, and I remember accessing archives of stuff that
|were more than 2 years old.
The internet - in some form - dates from the seventies, if I'm not mistaken, and started
as a connection between universities, so they could share resources. The military may
have had a networked communication system even earlier.
Gisele La Roche
news:9k8v0vso416glltvf...@4ax.com:
> On Sat, 28 Dec 2002 20:24:44 GMT, coryal...@hotmail.com (Cory C.
> Albrecht) wrote:
>
>|Nitpick: The Internet did too exist when TNG started - it just wasn't
>|the big commercialized thing it is today. Usenet was something totally
>|different from the Internet and AOL was a glorified BBS and not
>|connected to the Internet. I first got connected to the 'Net in 1989
>|when started university, and I remember accessing archives of stuff
>|that were more than 2 years old.
>
> The internet - in some form - dates from the seventies, if I'm not
> mistaken, and started as a connection between universities, so they
> could share resources. The military may have had a networked
> communication system even earlier.
Yes all that may be true but it isn't till the mid-90's that it became
big enough to have an impact on TV viewership.
Gisele
O Deus
> od...@bigfoot.com (O Deus) wrote in
> news:c6784f8f.0212...@posting.google.com:
>
> > Yes which is why I said that outside of genre SF fans, SF shows don't
> > really compete with each other with mainstream viewers. SF fans are
> > indeed very competitive, but the general public doesn't have those
> > loyalties or care. Nor do they have a quota of how many SF shows
> > they'll watch, it's a question of whether the show catches their
> > interest or not.
>
> Ok, I misunderstood what you said but I don't really get this point.
> I've lost the gist of it.
I mean that Star Trek and Babylon 5 fans may act territorial and snipe
at each other, but to the general public none of this feuding exists
and the shows never actually competed with each other unless they were
in the same time slot. The mainstream audience watches what it wants
to watch without being privy to the in-genre backbiting between
fandoms.
> >> > Saturation really isn't the problem that people make it out to be.
>
> With a smaller audience (sci-fi fans) when sci-fi is saturated, it does
> have an effect.
It is if there are a lot of good shows out there. Saturation isn't a
problem for Law and Order or for anyone else.
> > Not really. Consider the news stories on Star Wars fans standing on
> > line for a month to wait for Phantom Menace vs. the news stories
> > involving Star Trek fans. The former were treated credibly,
>
> NO way, Conan for instance had a sequence that made Star Wars fans look
> even worse than Star Trek fans. They really made fun of the fans and it
> was really funny.
Yeah, but Conan is sort of a Star Trek fan. To the general public,
Star Wars is mainstream and acceptable while Star Trek is nerdish and
ridiculous.
> >the latter
> > are usually treated as freaks even when the report itself is positive.
>
> So are Star Wars and sports fans... Of course they didn't have such
> things as "Trekkies" the movie. I hate that film.......grrrrrrr.
Yeah well good riddance to Denise Crosby.
> > Star Trek is not viewed as trendy by SF fans anymore and is treated
> > with contempt and to mainstream audiences, Star Trek fans have come to
> > represent a set of stereotypes best expressed in Shatner's infamous
> > Saturday Night Live opening skit.
>
> I think that's been there for a long time way before Enterprise.
Certainly the same Star Trek fandom that resurrected the franchise and
made it profitable also sowed the seeds of its popular contempt.
> > Yes TNG wouldn't do quite as well today, but it would do well.
>
> I disagree especially when you consider the first few seasons.
The first season or two may have been weak but the charachters were
and that's what people really look for.
> >After
> > all TNG was widely attacked by Star Trek fans when it first aired too.
> > And some of the factors you cite for TNG's success are correct, but
> > all those issues still overlook the reality that people liked TNG and
> > they still like it today.
>
> Nemesis says otherwise...
TNG the series. The movies have been disappointing. Though Nemesis'
failure is not a critical failure, but a scheduling failure.
> >> But how do you explain the fact that DS9's ratings were much higher
> >> than Voyager's? I mean during the time when both shows were on and
> >> when DS9 went off the air the fans didn't migrate to Voyager?
> >
> > The ratings for the two shows weren't all that far apart. Based on
> > Star Trek News's archived ratings
> > http://www.geocities.com/Hollywood/6952/ratings.htm Voyager may at
> > times have actually been pulling in more viewers.
> >
> > For instance both Scoprion II and A Time To Stand were the season
> > openers for the fall of 97. Stand pulled in under 5 and a half million
> > viewers, Scorpion II pulled in over 10 million. The ratings do draw
> > closer together later on in the season but Voyager is still ahead.
> > They go on to change more significantly later on because DS9 was in
> > its sixth season and had lost about as many viewers as it was going to
> > lose and hit its ground floor, while Voyager was still in its fourth
> > season and had more viewers to lose.
>
> DS9 still had higher viewership "overall". Voyager spiked here and
> there, yes.
Slightly higher. The differences were not all that significant.
Remember that ratings points for DS9 and Voyager are calculated
differently so that a 5.0 rating for DS9 is actually lower than a 4.8
rating for Voyager.
> >> The Pah Wraith cult followers were pretty clear on what they
> >> believed.
> >
> > Yes but we don't know much of anything about the Pah Wraiths
> > themselves who remained undeveloped.
>
> Agreed but I think with all the cast they had already (main and
> recurring) they had enough to do with the characters that people wanted
> to see.
Except that the Pah Wraiths were supposed to be the biggest villains,
bigger even than the Dominion, and they remained undeveloped.
> >Voyager may have
> > screwed up often, but at least aside from the Borg, it made the
> > effort. DS9 seemed content to rewrite the TNG universe.
>
> Not rewrite, expand and explore it. It wasn't a show where there was a
> ship to explore the galaxy. It was a space station which was the perfect
> opportunity to have recurring characters and villains. It was the
> perfect time to explore the Star Trek cultures and characters. It was a
> character driven show.
Rewrite. They rewrote the Ferengi as cartoonish and cowardly. They
rewrote Starfleet itself into a bunch of bigoted thugs controlled by a
secret organization. They rewrote the Bajorans into one note religious
fanatics.
The Defiant was added precisely to get away from the station, as yet
another bid to recapture TNG viewers. And up till Season 5, Ds9 did
its share of galactic exploration, some of it good. Indeed that was
DS9's original premise, to be the point of first contact and
exploration of a new quadrant of the galaxy. Then we discovered that
the entire quadrant is apparently run by the Dominion and they moved
away from the Gamma Quadrant and towards recycled TNG galactic power
politics.
> > Actually the problem was that like Garak, Dukat worked as a charachter
> > because he was somewhat sympathic and a bit ambivalent. And Behr, who
> > had the writing ability of a lobotomized Baywatch producer, never got
> > that and threw it all away in favor of a cliched nemesis for Sisko and
> > a showdown ripped from Star Wars Return of the Jedi.
>
> Ok, I see what you mean. I still think however that it was a good idea
> but it wasn't well developed. I think if Dukat had been made more
> dangerous and scary it would have worked better. As it was, it did
> diminish his character, yes.
Dangerous and scary doesn't come from a charachter acting like a
cliched villain. It's the more subtle charachters that can be really
disturbing. The guys who ramble on and go for the throat are movie
monsters. The guys who can talk rationally, have realistic motivations
and that you can relate to, are charachters and it's what makes them
disturbing and scary. It's why Weyoun made a good villain and why Evil
Dukat didn't. Behr decided that Dukat was Hitler and that's what he
decided to put on screen, even as Alaimo fought him every step of the
way.
> > Each failed series has in turn made it more difficult for the next one
> > to maintain credibility, attract viewers and hold on to them. That's
> > where we are now.
>
> I don't think DS9 failed at all. You are so negative. I am sorry you
> don't like DS9. I suspect you like Voyager?
Both Ds9 and Voyager had their good points and they had huge gaping
flaws too. I'm a fan of Star Trek, by which I mean Roddenberry created
Star Trek vs. Berman created Star Trek.
> > Well we clearly have different tastes. e.g. I tend to think that Way
> > of the Warrior was an action show with a handfull of good charachter
> > moments drowned in ridiculous action scenes (why the hell do the
> > Klingons keep drawing bladed weapons instead of using their disruptors
> > anyway?)
>
> Because they like to fight. It's too easy and too fast with disruptors.
> Geez, you don't know the Klingons very well do you.
Liking close combat is one thing, doing something stupid like
launching an invasion with bladed weapons isn't Klingon, it's Pakled.
It's the kind of cliched Klingon caricatures we kept getting on Ds9
and Voyager and now Enterprise.
Gisele La Roche
> I mean that Star Trek and Babylon 5 fans may act territorial and snipe
> at each other, but to the general public none of this feuding exists
> and the shows never actually competed with each other unless they were
> in the same time slot. The mainstream audience watches what it wants
> to watch without being privy to the in-genre backbiting between
> fandoms.
True but sci-fi fans know. They're the ones who count.
>> >> > Saturation really isn't the problem that people make it out to
>> >> > be.
>>
>> With a smaller audience (sci-fi fans) when sci-fi is saturated, it
>> does have an effect.
>
> It is if there are a lot of good shows out there. Saturation isn't a
> problem for Law and Order or for anyone else.
Well at the time of DS9 and Voyager there were. I listed them once in a
similar debate. I'd have to look for that. I don't know if I saved it.
Anyhow, I agree with what you say for Enterprise. There aren't that many
"good" shows out there right now but sci-fi is tired. Like I said,
people like fantasy more now. People are into psychics and magical
stuff. LOTR fits really well with this. Star Wars too.
>> > Not really. Consider the news stories on Star Wars fans standing on
>> > line for a month to wait for Phantom Menace vs. the news stories
>> > involving Star Trek fans. The former were treated credibly,
>>
>> NO way, Conan for instance had a sequence that made Star Wars fans
>> look even worse than Star Trek fans. They really made fun of the
>> fans and it was really funny.
>
> Yeah, but Conan is sort of a Star Trek fan. To the general public,
> Star Wars is mainstream and acceptable while Star Trek is nerdish and
> ridiculous.
Ok...but it's hard to see why. I think Star Wars is a lot more nerdy and
silly.
>> >> But how do you explain the fact that DS9's ratings were much
>> >> higher than Voyager's? I mean during the time when both shows
>> >> were on and when DS9 went off the air the fans didn't migrate to
>> >> Voyager?
>> >
>> > The ratings for the two shows weren't all that far apart. Based on
>> > Star Trek News's archived ratings
>> > http://www.geocities.com/Hollywood/6952/ratings.htm Voyager may at
>> > times have actually been pulling in more viewers.
>> >
>> > For instance both Scoprion II and A Time To Stand were the season
>> > openers for the fall of 97. Stand pulled in under 5 and a half
>> > million viewers, Scorpion II pulled in over 10 million. The ratings
>> > do draw closer together later on in the season but Voyager is still
>> > ahead. They go on to change more significantly later on because DS9
>> > was in its sixth season and had lost about as many viewers as it
>> > was going to lose and hit its ground floor, while Voyager was still
>> > in its fourth season and had more viewers to lose.
>>
>> DS9 still had higher viewership "overall". Voyager spiked here and
>> there, yes.
>
> Slightly higher. The differences were not all that significant.
> Remember that ratings points for DS9 and Voyager are calculated
> differently so that a 5.0 rating for DS9 is actually lower than a 4.8
> rating for Voyager.
Maybe so but Voyager's ratings towards the end were "very" low. DS9
still maintained a good enough rating throughout its run. For instance
DS9's average rating was a 4 and 5 while Voyager's was a 3 or even 2.
> Except that the Pah Wraiths were supposed to be the biggest villains,
> bigger even than the Dominion, and they remained undeveloped.
I thought they were developed enough. I preferred following the
characters and their adventures than knowing about the Pah Wraiths. I
would have liked to see them more developed but I don't find that
important for the type of villain they were.
>> >Voyager may have
>> > screwed up often, but at least aside from the Borg, it made the
>> > effort. DS9 seemed content to rewrite the TNG universe.
>>
>> Not rewrite, expand and explore it. It wasn't a show where there was
>> a ship to explore the galaxy. It was a space station which was the
>> perfect opportunity to have recurring characters and villains. It
>> was the perfect time to explore the Star Trek cultures and
>> characters. It was a character driven show.
>
> Rewrite. They rewrote the Ferengi as cartoonish and cowardly.
I didn't find Quark to be this way and he was the main character. They
were right-wing Capitalists to the extreme. They were hilarious. But it
depends on your taste. I know a lot of people didn't like the Ferengi
but I did.
The Ferengi of TNG were the cartoons I think. They certainly had no
substance. I love Quark, Brunt, Ishka or Moogie, even Rom and Grand
Nagus.
>They
> rewrote Starfleet itself into a bunch of bigoted thugs controlled by a
> secret organization.
If there's anything they did is they made them more human and realistic.
I think I'm starting to see the problem here. You liked Gene
Roddenberry's clean and ideal utopic world better than this one. That's
ok, many fans didn't like the realism or depth of DS9.
>They rewrote the Bajorans into one note religious
> fanatics.
I thought the Pah-Wraith cult followers were the fanatics. I didn't see
anything fanatical about the Bajorans.
>> Ok, I see what you mean. I still think however that it was a good
>> idea but it wasn't well developed. I think if Dukat had been made
>> more dangerous and scary it would have worked better. As it was, it
>> did diminish his character, yes.
>
> Dangerous and scary doesn't come from a charachter acting like a
> cliched villain. It's the more subtle charachters that can be really
> disturbing. The guys who ramble on and go for the throat are movie
> monsters. The guys who can talk rationally, have realistic motivations
> and that you can relate to, are charachters and it's what makes them
> disturbing and scary. It's why Weyoun made a good villain and why Evil
> Dukat didn't. Behr decided that Dukat was Hitler and that's what he
> decided to put on screen, even as Alaimo fought him every step of the
> way.
I thought of Dukat more as the devil at the end.
>> > Each failed series has in turn made it more difficult for the next
>> > one to maintain credibility, attract viewers and hold on to them.
>> > That's where we are now.
>>
>> I don't think DS9 failed at all. You are so negative. I am sorry
>> you don't like DS9. I suspect you like Voyager?
>
> Both Ds9 and Voyager had their good points and they had huge gaping
> flaws too. I'm a fan of Star Trek, by which I mean Roddenberry created
> Star Trek vs. Berman created Star Trek.
Ah, ok, it's what I thought. You liked the utopic view of the
Roddenberry ideal future. You are like most TOS and TNG fans. They
didn't like DS9's grittier, darker side. They wanted the Federation to
be pure. Oh well, I like TNG, it's a good show. I love DS9, it was more
realistic and deep. I dislike Voyager more and more with time because it
was the Jeri Ryan (experiencing her humanity over and over again or a new
emotion of the week.....blech) show with wimped down Borg and Q. I still
like TOS. But we all have our favorites so that's ok.
Take care,
Gisele
asdf
>> You don't know Ebert very well if you call him an artsy-fartsy critic.
>
>It's not an unfair summation. He promotes indies and Miramax type
>films at the expense of more mainstream movies. That was the whole
>concept of the Siskel and Ebert and now Ebert and Roeper pairing .
>Siskel\Roeper was the more voice of the common man critic, while Ebert
>was the voice of cineate critic.
Actually you got it backwards. Siskel was the "intellectual" critic, while
Ebert was the "common man" critic. As I said in another posting, Ebert makes
an attempt to judge a movie by how its target audience may view it. Roeper is
not a "common man" critic being one of the only "mainstream" critics to give a
thumbs down to LotR Fellowship of the Ring.
asdf
>Gene Siskel, Roeper from Ebert and Roeper, EW and others have all given
>it thumbs up. I have trouble arguing on this because I still haven't
>seen the movie which I plan to do tomorrow.
Gene Siskel gave "Nemesis" a thumbs up? <grin>
Gisele La Roche
news:20021230023517...@mb-cr.aol.com:
>>od...@bigfoot.com (O Deus) wrote:
>>> You don't know Ebert very well if you call him an artsy-fartsy
>>> critic.
>>
>>It's not an unfair summation. He promotes indies and Miramax type
>>films at the expense of more mainstream movies. That was the whole
>>concept of the Siskel and Ebert and now Ebert and Roeper pairing .
>>Siskel\Roeper was the more voice of the common man critic, while Ebert
>>was the voice of cineate critic.
>
> Actually you got it backwards. Siskel was the "intellectual" critic,
> while Ebert was the "common man" critic. As I said in another
> posting, Ebert makes an attempt to judge a movie by how its target
> audience may view it. Roeper is not a "common man" critic being one
> of the only "mainstream" critics to give a thumbs down to LotR
> Fellowship of the Ring.
Well regardless of how you see it, I go by what Ebert does. He usually
doesn't give sci-fi movies thumbs up. He's that way with comedy too
unless they have heavyweight actors in it. But when it comes to drama,
it's very rare that he'll give it a bad rating. Again if it has well
known (especially older) actors, he'll almost always give it a thumbs up.
Gisele
O Deus
> od...@bigfoot.com (O Deus) wrote in
> news:c6784f8f.02122...@posting.google.com:
>
> > I mean that Star Trek and Babylon 5 fans may act territorial and snipe
> > at each other, but to the general public none of this feuding exists
> > and the shows never actually competed with each other unless they were
> > in the same time slot. The mainstream audience watches what it wants
> > to watch without being privy to the in-genre backbiting between
> > fandoms.
>
> True but sci-fi fans know. They're the ones who count.
As the dedicated core fanbase perhaps, but not so much rating wise.
> >> >> > Saturation really isn't the problem that people make it out to
> >> >> > be.
> >>
> >> With a smaller audience (sci-fi fans) when sci-fi is saturated, it
> >> does have an effect.
> >
> > It is if there are a lot of good shows out there. Saturation isn't a
> > problem for Law and Order or for anyone else.
>
> Well at the time of DS9 and Voyager there were. I listed them once in a
> similar debate. I'd have to look for that. I don't know if I saved it.
> Anyhow, I agree with what you say for Enterprise. There aren't that many
> "good" shows out there right now but sci-fi is tired. Like I said,
> people like fantasy more now. People are into psychics and magical
> stuff. LOTR fits really well with this. Star Wars too.
LOTR has a huge built in fanbase and lots of hype going for it. Star
Wars is fantasy but most people think it's SF because it's veiled in
SF material. But fantasy doesn't have a great track record at the box
office or on TV. SF works much better. And even though most of them
have bombed, far more SF films were made this year than fantasy films.
> >> > Not really. Consider the news stories on Star Wars fans standing on
> >> > line for a month to wait for Phantom Menace vs. the news stories
> >> > involving Star Trek fans. The former were treated credibly,
> >>
> >> NO way, Conan for instance had a sequence that made Star Wars fans
> >> look even worse than Star Trek fans. They really made fun of the
> >> fans and it was really funny.
> >
> > Yeah, but Conan is sort of a Star Trek fan. To the general public,
> > Star Wars is mainstream and acceptable while Star Trek is nerdish and
> > ridiculous.
>
> Ok...but it's hard to see why. I think Star Wars is a lot more nerdy and
> silly.
Yes but those things are relative. Since Star Wars is popular today,
it isn't considered any of those things. Once the backlash kicks in,
more time will be spent mocking the Star Wars fans who wait on line
for 30 days to see the movie and build R2-D2's out of trash cans.
Voyager's ratings were poor towards the end, though not quite that
poor. And DS9's ratings would also have been worse had it been around
that late as Star Trek's popularity continued and continues to decease
resulting in shrinking ratings for Enterprise. While at the time both
shows were on, the ratings were not that far apart and Voyager was
occasionally ahead.
> >> > Each failed series has in turn made it more difficult for the next
> >> > one to maintain credibility, attract viewers and hold on to them.
> >> > That's where we are now.
> >>
> >> I don't think DS9 failed at all. You are so negative. I am sorry
> >> you don't like DS9. I suspect you like Voyager?
> >
> > Both Ds9 and Voyager had their good points and they had huge gaping
> > flaws too. I'm a fan of Star Trek, by which I mean Roddenberry created
> > Star Trek vs. Berman created Star Trek.
>
> Ah, ok, it's what I thought. You liked the utopic view of the
> Roddenberry ideal future. You are like most TOS and TNG fans. They
> didn't like DS9's grittier, darker side. They wanted the Federation to
> be pure. Oh well, I like TNG, it's a good show. I love DS9, it was more
> realistic and deep. I dislike Voyager more and more with time because it
> was the Jeri Ryan (experiencing her humanity over and over again or a new
> emotion of the week.....blech) show with wimped down Borg and Q. I still
> like TOS. But we all have our favorites so that's ok.
TOS was hardly utopian though that charge is leveled time and time
again. By no stretch of the imagination can Kirk or McCoy be
considered perfect, let alone unrealistically perfect charachters. Nor
was Starfleet perfect. We saw bigotry, incompetence, cruelty and a
variety of other flaws. What we did not see was the institutionalized
bigotry of DS9's 'Dr Bashir I Presume', we did not see our main
charachters worshipping aliens and taking orders from them and we did
not see wars dragged on for the sake of ratings. But then Starfleet
and the Federation were not particularly relevant to DS9.
Gisele La Roche
> TOS was hardly utopian though that charge is leveled time and time
> again.
TOS and TNG were of a future where Starfleet and the Federation IS
portrayed as pure. There is no Section 31. Even Vulcans are shown to be
almost holy in their attitudes and ways. Yes, some of the characters
have flaws but they're there for the sake of adding conflict to the
stories. Overall, from a production standpoint, Roddenberry did not want
the Federation or Starfleet to be at war like we had in DS9 (According to
Majel Barrett Roddenberry). In this view, the future would be without
conflict or war. The characters weren't perfect but they were viewed
that way. IOW, they could do no wrong. Those that did were always shown
to be evil or sick. In DS9, Sisko tricks the Romulans into the war ("In
the Pale Moonlight") It was one of the best eps of DS9. Picard would
never have done that, Kirk maybe, Janeway never. It showed a situation
where even Sisko was feeling overwhelming guilt at what had happened but
it showed that sometimes (realistically) things aren't always as rosy as
they were in TNG and TOS.
>By no stretch of the imagination can Kirk or McCoy be
> considered perfect, let alone unrealistically perfect charachters. Nor
> was Starfleet perfect. We saw bigotry, incompetence, cruelty and a
> variety of other flaws. What we did not see was the institutionalized
> bigotry of DS9's 'Dr Bashir I Presume',
What are you talking about? In that ep Starfleet had strict rules
against genetic enhancements mostly because of Khan for example. Anyhow,
DS9 was a much more realistic portrayal of humanity. TOS was also this
way but was still utopic in its views. TNG was a lot more idealistic and
utopic. Voyager, well to be honest, I don't care.
>we did not see our main
> charachters worshipping aliens
We didn't see this in DS9. We saw Bajorans doing this. As for Jadzia I
showed you how that can be looked at in other ways. Yours is just one
way. As to Sisko, he didn't worship the Prophets as such. In addition,
the Prophets and the Pah Wraiths were shown to be "aliens" and not gods
except to the Bajorans.
>and taking orders from them
Starfleet and the Federation did not take orders from the Prophets.
Sisko was the Emissary and as such was "influenced" by them. That's not
the same thing.
>and we did
> not see wars dragged on for the sake of ratings.
This is the first time I've seen such an in depth view of what war is all
about. It wasn't just for ratings (all shows do things for this not just
DS9), it was an integral part of the series overall story. It was
fantastic.
>But then Starfleet
> and the Federation were not particularly relevant to DS9.
Wow, I don't think you really watched this show.
Now we can go on if you like or we can call it a draw. I think at this
point we are only going to repeat ourselves. If you want to go on, just
reply and I'll answer you if I think it's worth our while.
Take care,
Gisele
O Deus
> od...@bigfoot.com (O Deus) wrote in
> news:c6784f8f.02123...@posting.google.com:
>
> > TOS was hardly utopian though that charge is leveled time and time
> > again.
>
> TOS and TNG were of a future where Starfleet and the Federation IS
> portrayed as pure.
Hardly. In Gallileo 7 we see bigotry among Starfleet officers. In
Conscience of the King we meet the governor of a Federation planet who
carried out genocide. In Doomsday Machine we meet a dangerously
suicidal Starfleet Captain. In Errand of Mercy Kirk recognizes that
the Federation has more than a little common with the Klingons. In A
Private Little War, the Federation ends up subsidizing a planetary
civil war and breaking the Prime Directive to carry on brinkmanship
with the Klingons. In the Way to Eden we there is significant
dissatisfaction within the Federation.
I could go on for much longer too and this is even without addressing
TNG which features numerous incidents of corruption and treason among
Federation officers and in The Drumhead, we even see a totalitarian
mindset among prominent Federation hierarchy and the extent to which
civil rights can quickly be subverted within the Federation.
All this is realistic. It does not however portray the Federation as
basically useless except when Sisko needs backup, as maintaining
bigoted policies and a secret organization operating since the dawn of
the Federation which serves as the UFP equivalent of the Obsidian
Order. That, like much of DS9 including its insistence that its
shapeshifters were the only ones in existance though we've seen
otherwise numerous times, flies in the face of basic Star Trek
continuity.
> There is no Section 31.
There never was and there still isn't.
> Even Vulcans are shown to be
> almost holy in their attitudes and ways.
Hardly. Sarek treats his son poorly. T'Pring manipulates Spock into
nearly killing Kirk. Vulcans conceal their Pon Farr because they're
ashamed of it and resolve conflicts with a ritual fight to the death.
This is realistic and a nuanced view of an alien species. By contrast
DS9 seemed to have a pathological hatred for Vulcans, Take Me Out To
The Holosuite would have been outright bigotry and race baiting if it
had involved a human race. But then this was similar to DS9's
treatment of the Ferengi.
> Overall, from a production standpoint, Roddenberry did not want
> the Federation or Starfleet to be at war like we had in DS9
Because it was a show about exploration, not a series of repetitive
battle scenes which is what DS9's final seasons turned into. We don't
need to go into space for that, we can fight battles right here. We
can't explore a black hole right here.
> (According to
> Majel Barrett Roddenberry). In this view, the future would be without
> conflict or war.
In Errand of Mercy the Federation was at the threshold of war. Prior
to TOS there had been a war with the Romulans. Prior to TNG there had
been a war with the Cardassians. Dozens of TOS and TNG episodes dealt
with conflict between Enterprise and other races. So this doesn't
remotely stand up.
> The characters weren't perfect but they were viewed
> that way. IOW, they could do no wrong.
> Those that did were always shown
> to be evil or sick.
Kirk violated the Prime Directive numerous times. He makes any number
of questionable decisions and in City on the Edge of Forever, he
nearly wipes out the Federation because he can't stand to see Edith
die.
> In DS9, Sisko tricks the Romulans into the war ("In
> the Pale Moonlight") It was one of the best eps of DS9.
> It showed a situation
> where even Sisko was feeling overwhelming guilt at what had happened but
> it showed that sometimes (realistically) things aren't always as rosy as
> they were in TNG and TOS.
No he doesn't. Garak does it for him. Sisko just gives the okay and
then rants about it. Considering that Sisko had already used
biological weapons on civilians in For The Uniform and congratulated
himself on being the bad guy, Sisko suddenly finding his morals came
off as laughable hypocritical.
It might have been more interesting if Sisko had instead reexamined
his questionable and completely unauthorized decision to plunge the
Federation and the Klingon Empire into war in Way of the Warrior which
achieved nothing except the death of hundreds of thousands on both
sides and helped pave the way for the Dominion invasion to come.
As to how 'rosy' things are. Episodes like A Private Little War
showcased far more difficult moral dillemas which showcased real
ambigious problems, instead of Sisko delivering his trademark ritalin
inspired overacting over something everyone agrees he had to do and
something Kirk would have done without hesitating an instant.
> >By no stretch of the imagination can Kirk or McCoy be
> > considered perfect, let alone unrealistically perfect charachters. Nor
> > was Starfleet perfect. We saw bigotry, incompetence, cruelty and a
> > variety of other flaws. What we did not see was the institutionalized
> > bigotry of DS9's 'Dr Bashir I Presume',
>
> What are you talking about? In that ep Starfleet had strict rules
> against genetic enhancements mostly because of Khan for example.
It was a ridiculous bigoted role that the Federation would never have
had as it punished children for the sins of their parents. The
justifications about unfair competition that are presented there are
even more ridiculous as Starfleet is full of species with better than
human abilities.
> Anyhow,
> DS9 was a much more realistic portrayal of humanity.
DS9 wasn't a portrait of humanity. It barely even had human
charachters in relation to TOS or TNG.
> >we did not see our main
> > charachters worshipping aliens
>
> We didn't see this in DS9. We saw Bajorans doing this. As for Jadzia I
> showed you how that can be looked at in other ways. Yours is just one
> way. As to Sisko, he didn't worship the Prophets as such. In addition,
> the Prophets and the Pah Wraiths were shown to be "aliens" and not gods
> except to the Bajorans.
We saw pretty much everyone reffering to them as 'Prophets' by the
end. Jadzia Dax herself pointed up the distinction between 'Wormhole
Aliens' and 'Prophets.' You didn't see Picard calling Q, God. Even
though Q wanted him to and was more powerful than any wormhole alien.
But then in Star Trek, the Captains had their dignity and commitment
to human values instead of letting themselves become puppets of any
powerfull alien that came around. In TOS and TNG charachters stood up
to aliens who claimed to be Gods, on DS9 they took orders from them.
> >and taking orders from them
>
> Starfleet and the Federation did not take orders from the Prophets.
> Sisko was the Emissary and as such was "influenced" by them. That's not
> the same thing.
They commanded him to do things and he did them. Same difference.
> Now we can go on if you like or we can call it a draw. I think at this
> point we are only going to repeat ourselves. If you want to go on, just
> reply and I'll answer you if I think it's worth our while.
No I don't see that it is. Like most Trek fans I simply had no use for
the series and it's not a difference in views that's going to be
bridged over with any amount of words.
David Johnston
>
> od...@bigfoot.com (O Deus) wrote in
> news:c6784f8f.02123...@posting.google.com:
>
> > TOS was hardly utopian though that charge is leveled time and time
> > again.
>
> TOS and TNG were of a future where Starfleet and the Federation IS
> portrayed as pure. There is no Section 31.
The Enterprise Incident argues otherwise. It's a straight-up espionage
operation utilising massive amounts of deceit and skullduggery.
Not very pure, really. Neither was the proxy fight where the Federation
and the Klingons were aggravating local conflict by handing out more
advanced weapons so the locals could kill each other with greater enthusiasm.
And the Federation still had criminals, diseases, and people who were greedy.
Gisele La Roche
od...@bigfoot.com (O Deus) wrote in
news:c6784f8f.02123...@posting.google.com:
> Gisele La Roche <gisele...@yahoo.com> wrote in message
> news:<Xns92F4E90B630F5gi...@66.185.95.104>...
>> od...@bigfoot.com (O Deus) wrote in
>> news:c6784f8f.02123...@posting.google.com:
>>
>> > TOS was hardly utopian though that charge is leveled time and time
>> > again.
>>
>> TOS and TNG were of a future where Starfleet and the Federation IS
>> portrayed as pure.
>
> Hardly. In Gallileo 7 we see bigotry among Starfleet officers. In
> Conscience of the King we meet the governor of a Federation planet who
> carried out genocide. In Doomsday Machine we meet a dangerously
> suicidal Starfleet Captain. In Errand of Mercy Kirk recognizes that
> the Federation has more than a little common with the Klingons. In A
> Private Little War, the Federation ends up subsidizing a planetary
> civil war and breaking the Prime Directive to carry on brinkmanship
> with the Klingons. In the Way to Eden we there is significant
> dissatisfaction within the Federation.
First of all, the episodes you list above all end in a positive way. They
all reaffirm the "goodness" of Starfleet and the Federation. In
"Conscience of the King" I realize it wasn't so rosy an ending but Kirk
still did the right thing. Earth's Federation still ends up being the
"good guy". In a way, a lot of Trek is a reflection of the American
government. In TOS we had one episode where there is even a planet with
the American flag. Kirk at the end reads the American constitution or
whatever. In DS9, we see that governments are not so perfect. Things are
much more realistic and reflect a lot more the reality out there. Politics
are much more realistic on DS9. Think of the ep where Quark sells arms or
the one where Rom creates the bar association and so on.
> I could go on for much longer too and this is even without addressing
> TNG which features numerous incidents of corruption and treason among
> Federation officers and in The Drumhead, we even see a totalitarian
> mindset among prominent Federation hierarchy and the extent to which
> civil rights can quickly be subverted within the Federation.
Yes but again in the end Picard upholds the "idealistic" values of
Starfleet and the Federation. Needless to say, even in DS9 the good guys
in the end were the good guys.
> All this is realistic. It does not however portray the Federation as
> basically useless except when Sisko needs backup,
DS9 was a Bajoran space station. Sisko was there to represent the
Federation. It wasn't the flag ship of Starfleet. Starfleet would be less
involved in this case. DS9 was about cultures and the characters that make
up those cultures. It wasn't about a Starfleet crew. The second in
command was Kira, a Bajoran. The Bajoran government had a lot of influence
on Sisko and DS9. Also, the Bajoran spiritual leaders were very much
involved. It wasn't at all the same situation as you had on the
Enterprise. Bajor wasn't part of the Federation and DS9 was a port for
many aliens who visited it. Sisko was in charge of the station but he had
to take into account that it wasn't strictly a Federation station. Things
were very different on DS9 than on the Enterprise. Remember when Worf came
on the station. He had to adjust to a very different reality than the one
he lived on the Enterprise. Like Sisko said, everything here is more of a
shade of grey, there's no black and white.
>as maintaining
> bigoted policies
Please elaborate...
>and a secret organization operating since the dawn of
> the Federation which serves as the UFP equivalent of the Obsidian
> Order.
And added a big slice of reality to the politics of the Federation much
like we see in the reality of the U.S. government.
>That, like much of DS9 including its insistence that its
> shapeshifters were the only ones in existance though we've seen
> otherwise numerous times, flies in the face of basic Star Trek
> continuity.
Odo and the Founders were unique in their own right. Odo thought he was
the only one who was like that. I agree we've seen other types of
shapeshifters but not like the Dominion ones. Still now you're nitpicking.
>> There is no Section 31.
>
> There never was and there still isn't.
Why because it makes the Federation less of a utopic, idealistic and
frankly unreal entity?
>> Even Vulcans are shown to be
>> almost holy in their attitudes and ways.
>
> Hardly. Sarek treats his son poorly. T'Pring manipulates Spock into
> nearly killing Kirk. Vulcans conceal their Pon Farr because they're
> ashamed of it and resolve conflicts with a ritual fight to the death.
But they are shown to be good guys nonetheless. Overall the attitude of
fans towards the Vulcans has always been that they are extremely good. Why
do you think that so many fans don't like how the Vulcans are portrayed on
Enterprise. So many were convinced (mostly by Spock's portrayal) that
Vulcans never lie and so on. It's been the overall view of many fans that
Vulcans are idealistic, utopic good guys.
> This is realistic and a nuanced view of an alien species. By contrast
> DS9 seemed to have a pathological hatred for Vulcans, Take Me Out To
> The Holosuite would have been outright bigotry and race baiting if it
> had involved a human race. But then this was similar to DS9's
> treatment of the Ferengi.
Lol you are clutching at straws. I think the portrayal on DS9 again showed
a variation of Vulcans that most would not have thought of. It showed that
they weren't "perfect".
>> Overall, from a production standpoint, Roddenberry did not want
>> the Federation or Starfleet to be at war like we had in DS9
>
> Because it was a show about exploration, not a series of repetitive
> battle scenes which is what DS9's final seasons turned into.
You know I'm starting to think you didn't watch DS9 all that much. It was
so much more than that. It dealt with the war, yes, but it dealt with what
the characters were going through. Have you read my tribute? I only
skimmed what went on in the series and yet I said a lot in it. There were
so many layers to DS9 that it would take a book to discuss it. Remember it
was a character driven show.
>We don't
> need to go into space for that, we can fight battles right here. We
> can't explore a black hole right here.
But DS9 was not a Starfleet ship. It was a space station with a myriad of
things going on on it. It featured a large variety of cultures and
characters. It wasn't TNG or TOS.
>> (According to
>> Majel Barrett Roddenberry). In this view, the future would be
>> without conflict or war.
>
> In Errand of Mercy the Federation was at the threshold of war. Prior
> to TOS there had been a war with the Romulans. Prior to TNG there had
> been a war with the Cardassians. Dozens of TOS and TNG episodes dealt
> with conflict between Enterprise and other races. So this doesn't
> remotely stand up.
Oh they talked about it but they never really explored it. DS9 was more
than just the war but it explored the subject thoroughly.
>> The characters weren't perfect but they were viewed
>> that way. IOW, they could do no wrong.
>> Those that did were always shown
>> to be evil or sick.
>
> Kirk violated the Prime Directive numerous times. He makes any number
> of questionable decisions and in City on the Edge of Forever, he
> nearly wipes out the Federation because he can't stand to see Edith
> die.
But how did it always end?
>> In DS9, Sisko tricks the Romulans into the war ("In
>> the Pale Moonlight") It was one of the best eps of DS9.
>> It showed a situation
>> where even Sisko was feeling overwhelming guilt at what had happened
>> but it showed that sometimes (realistically) things aren't always as
>> rosy as they were in TNG and TOS.
>
> No he doesn't. Garak does it for him. Sisko just gives the okay and
> then rants about it.
But Sisko is well aware that what he is doing is not ethical. To trick the
Romulans into the war is not something I think Picard would even think of
doing. It wouldn't fit in with the way he was portrayed as the
quintessential Starfleet captain. Kirk, it depends but I doubt that
Roddenberry would have wanted Kirk or Picard involved in an all out war to
begin with.
>Considering that Sisko had already used
> biological weapons on civilians in For The Uniform and congratulated
> himself on being the bad guy, Sisko suddenly finding his morals came
> off as laughable hypocritical.
He went to extremes to get his man. Look at the episode again. This is
the difference between the idealistic and utopic view we got on TNG for
instance. Would you see Picard go that far? Still, I look at this episode
as a tangent to the series. The Maquis subplot to the overall story didn't
live long.
> It might have been more interesting if Sisko had instead reexamined
> his questionable and completely unauthorized decision to plunge the
> Federation and the Klingon Empire into war in Way of the Warrior which
> achieved nothing except the death of hundreds of thousands on both
> sides and helped pave the way for the Dominion invasion to come.
If I remember well, the Klingons wanted to attack Cardassia and were
stopping ships from leaving DS9 because they were convinced that the
leaders of Cardassia were actually changelings. Anyhow, Worf thought that
this was merely Gowron's idea to fire up the Klingon's warrior lifestyle.
It is called "Way of the Warrior" by the way. At this point, Cardassia was
not in league with the Dominion. Anyway, rewatch those two episodes. I
think you're missing something.
> As to how 'rosy' things are. Episodes like A Private Little War
> showcased far more difficult moral dillemas which showcased real
> ambigious problems, instead of Sisko delivering his trademark ritalin
> inspired overacting over something everyone agrees he had to do and
> something Kirk would have done without hesitating an instant.
Lol, speaking of performances, Shatner????? puhleaze. Anyhow, you see what
you see and I see things differently. TOS had many good episodes that
still stand the test of time today, true. But so does DS9. It all depends
on whether you liked the show or not I guess. You didn't, I did.
>> >By no stretch of the imagination can Kirk or McCoy be
>> > considered perfect, let alone unrealistically perfect charachters.
>> > Nor was Starfleet perfect. We saw bigotry, incompetence, cruelty
>> > and a variety of other flaws. What we did not see was the
>> > institutionalized bigotry of DS9's 'Dr Bashir I Presume',
>>
>> What are you talking about? In that ep Starfleet had strict rules
>> against genetic enhancements mostly because of Khan for example.
>
> It was a ridiculous bigoted role that the Federation would never have
> had as it punished children for the sins of their parents. The
> justifications about unfair competition that are presented there are
> even more ridiculous as Starfleet is full of species with better than
> human abilities.
I think after Khan some rules were put in place. They did have a Eugenics
war after all. I think it made perfect sense that they would have laws
concerning genetic enhancement. Regardless, this was just one episode.
Again, you are nitpicking.
>> Anyhow,
>> DS9 was a much more realistic portrayal of humanity.
>
> DS9 wasn't a portrait of humanity. It barely even had human
> charachters in relation to TOS or TNG.
Don't you know sci-fi uses aliens often times to explore human issues?
Whether it had to do with religion, politics, war, greed, sexism, love or
hate, you could find it on DS9. It was so much more than the narrow view
you have of it. Still we did have O'brien, Keiko, Kassidy, Sisko, Jake,
Bashir and others nonetheless.
>> >we did not see our main
>> > charachters worshipping aliens
>>
>> We didn't see this in DS9. We saw Bajorans doing this. As for
>> Jadzia I showed you how that can be looked at in other ways. Yours
>> is just one way. As to Sisko, he didn't worship the Prophets as
>> such. In addition, the Prophets and the Pah Wraiths were shown to be
>> "aliens" and not gods except to the Bajorans.
>
> We saw pretty much everyone reffering to them as 'Prophets' by the
> end. Jadzia Dax herself pointed up the distinction between 'Wormhole
> Aliens' and 'Prophets.' You didn't see Picard calling Q, God. Even
> though Q wanted him to and was more powerful than any wormhole alien.
You can't compare the two instances. First of all, the only ones who
"worshipped" the Prophets were the Bajorans. Sisko had a unique
relationship with them but even towards the end he really didn't follow
what they wanted. He questioned them continuously. He married Kassidy
even though Sarah didn't want him to, and so on. But he was destined to be
the Emissary and be a Prophet himself in the end. Not at all the same as
Picard and Q.
> But then in Star Trek, the Captains had their dignity and commitment
> to human values instead of letting themselves become puppets of any
> powerfull alien that came around. In TOS and TNG charachters stood up
> to aliens who claimed to be Gods, on DS9 they took orders from them.
You're overexagerating here and I'm seriously wondering if you watched the
show like I did. It sounds like you watched the odd episode here and there
because you're missing the overall storyline somehow.
>> >and taking orders from them
>>
>> Starfleet and the Federation did not take orders from the Prophets.
>> Sisko was the Emissary and as such was "influenced" by them. That's
>> not the same thing.
>
> They commanded him to do things and he did them. Same difference.
Not really. He knew he had to find the Orb of the Emissary at the end of
the series but that was because the wormhole was shut down and he didn't
know what to do. He was "guided" by them but not commanded. He did things
they didn't want him to do like marry Kassidy. He pretty much did what he
thought he should do not what they "commanded". The Pah Wraiths were
dangerous. Kai Winn was controlled by them and was going to release them
from their prison. Their intentions were to destroy the Alpha quadrant.
Meanwhile, there was the Dominion to worry about. Oh, so many layers. If
all you got out of DS9 was the viewpoint you ended up with then I'm sorry
because I and I know a lot of other fans got so much more out of it.
>> Now we can go on if you like or we can call it a draw. I think at
>> this point we are only going to repeat ourselves. If you want to go
>> on, just reply and I'll answer you if I think it's worth our while.
>
> No I don't see that it is. Like most Trek fans I simply had no use for
> the series and it's not a difference in views that's going to be
> bridged over with any amount of words.
I'm not trying to convince you that you are wrong. In fact, I think many
of your views are very valid. It's just that I approach it differently
than you do and I think you should know about what some Niners think of
DS9. I'm sure a lot of fans agree with you and some agree with me.
I think we've had a very good discussion. We both are at odds and I
suspect we will always be but that's fine. Like I said, we all have our
favorite shows. That's the sad part of it all. We're not Trekkies/ers
anymore. We're Niners or TNGers or whatever.
Take care,
Gisele
Gisele La Roche
news:3E1129...@telusplanet.net:
See my reply to O Deus...
Gisele
O Deus
> >> > TOS was hardly utopian though that charge is leveled time and time
> >> > again.
> >>
> >> TOS and TNG were of a future where Starfleet and the Federation IS
> >> portrayed as pure.
> >
> > Hardly. In Gallileo 7 we see bigotry among Starfleet officers. In
> > Conscience of the King we meet the governor of a Federation planet who
> > carried out genocide. In Doomsday Machine we meet a dangerously
> > suicidal Starfleet Captain. In Errand of Mercy Kirk recognizes that
> > the Federation has more than a little common with the Klingons. In A
> > Private Little War, the Federation ends up subsidizing a planetary
> > civil war and breaking the Prime Directive to carry on brinkmanship
> > with the Klingons. In the Way to Eden we there is significant
> > dissatisfaction within the Federation.
>
> First of all, the episodes you list above all end in a positive way. They
> all reaffirm the "goodness" of Starfleet and the Federation. In
> "Conscience of the King" I realize it wasn't so rosy an ending but Kirk
> still did the right thing.
That certainly isn't true of A Private Little War or Errand of Mercy
which both end with Kirk questioning his values and his decisions.
> In DS9, we see that governments are not so perfect. Things are
> much more realistic and reflect a lot more the reality out there.
When was the UFP perfect in TOS or TNG? We had a long parade of
corrupt, bullying and incompetent Admirals and Ambassadors. We have a
Starfleet coup attempt. Corrupt Admirals played a major role in TNG
with episodes like Pegasus and Star Trek Insurrection in which the
Federation makes a deal to take away the homes of the Baku in exchange
for life extension.
> Politics
> are much more realistic on DS9. Think of the ep where Quark sells arms or
> the one where Rom creates the bar association and so on.
Not really. Quark's change of heart is cliched and telegraphed. In
point of fact Quark never seemed to have moral qualms about engaging
in activities which cost lives before. So like Sisko in Pale Moonlight
it's a showcased moral crisis.
And do you really think it's 'realistic' that Rom became the leader of
Ferenginar and had no trouble converting the place to a liberal
democracy?
> >That, like much of DS9 including its insistence that its
> > shapeshifters were the only ones in existance though we've seen
> > otherwise numerous times, flies in the face of basic Star Trek
> > continuity.
>
> Odo and the Founders were unique in their own right. Odo thought he was
> the only one who was like that. I agree we've seen other types of
> shapeshifters but not like the Dominion ones. Still now you're nitpicking.
The claim was repeated that they were unique because they were
shapeshifters, because they could shapeshift. Endless examples prove
that this isn't the case. And this isn't a minor point, it was
repeated over and over again and served as a major plot point for the
series.
> >> There is no Section 31.
> >
> > There never was and there still isn't.
>
> Why because it makes the Federation less of a utopic, idealistic and
> frankly unreal entity?
So the Federation is unreal unless there's some secret police force
operating behind the scenes using tactics more reminiscent of Get
Smart than a serious inteligence agency?
> >> Even Vulcans are shown to be
> >> almost holy in their attitudes and ways.
> >
> > Hardly. Sarek treats his son poorly. T'Pring manipulates Spock into
> > nearly killing Kirk. Vulcans conceal their Pon Farr because they're
> > ashamed of it and resolve conflicts with a ritual fight to the death.
>
> But they are shown to be good guys nonetheless. Overall the attitude of
> fans towards the Vulcans has always been that they are extremely good. Why
> do you think that so many fans don't like how the Vulcans are portrayed on
> Enterprise. So many were convinced (mostly by Spock's portrayal) that
> Vulcans never lie and so on. It's been the overall view of many fans that
> Vulcans are idealistic, utopic good guys.
I've demonstrated above that they're shown to be no such thing, but
that they have nuance and complexity. As for Vulcans lying, that issue
was covered long before Enterprise. And Vulcans do indeed mislead,
they just tend not to lie directly. A tradition T'Pol has tended to
keep up.
> > This is realistic and a nuanced view of an alien species. By contrast
> > DS9 seemed to have a pathological hatred for Vulcans, Take Me Out To
> > The Holosuite would have been outright bigotry and race baiting if it
> > had involved a human race. But then this was similar to DS9's
> > treatment of the Ferengi.
>
> Lol you are clutching at straws. I think the portrayal on DS9 again showed
> a variation of Vulcans that most would not have thought of. It showed that
> they weren't "perfect".
Umm...it showed that Sisko and DS9's producers rabidly hated them. But
Season 7 seemed to go in for Vulcan bashing with that silly Vulcan
serial killer episode.
> >> Overall, from a production standpoint, Roddenberry did not want
> >> the Federation or Starfleet to be at war like we had in DS9
> >
> > Because it was a show about exploration, not a series of repetitive
> > battle scenes which is what DS9's final seasons turned into.
>
> You know I'm starting to think you didn't watch DS9 all that much. It was
> so much more than that. It dealt with the war, yes, but it dealt with what
> the characters were going through.
I've seen pretty much every episode. And it didn't deal with the war
in any way beyond the surface cliches.
> >We don't
> > need to go into space for that, we can fight battles right here. We
> > can't explore a black hole right here.
>
> But DS9 was not a Starfleet ship. It was a space station with a myriad of
> things going on on it. It featured a large variety of cultures and
> characters. It wasn't TNG or TOS.
It was supposed to deal with the Gamma Quadrant, instead it mostly
ended up dealing with the Alpha Quadrant. It was a failure of
imagination.
> >> In DS9, Sisko tricks the Romulans into the war ("In
> >> the Pale Moonlight") It was one of the best eps of DS9.
> >> It showed a situation
> >> where even Sisko was feeling overwhelming guilt at what had happened
> >> but it showed that sometimes (realistically) things aren't always as
> >> rosy as they were in TNG and TOS.
> >
> > No he doesn't. Garak does it for him. Sisko just gives the okay and
> > then rants about it.
>
> But Sisko is well aware that what he is doing is not ethical. To trick the
> Romulans into the war is not something I think Picard would even think of
> doing. It wouldn't fit in with the way he was portrayed as the
> quintessential Starfleet captain. Kirk, it depends but I doubt that
> Roddenberry would have wanted Kirk or Picard involved in an all out war to
> begin with.
Depends on the situation. Sisko didn't do anything all that far out of
bounds. And he'd done much worse things before. The worst thing he did
in this episode was plant misinformation to the Romulans. Boo Hoo.
Kirk could have done that over his lunch break.
> >Considering that Sisko had already used
> > biological weapons on civilians in For The Uniform and congratulated
> > himself on being the bad guy, Sisko suddenly finding his morals came
> > off as laughable hypocritical.
>
> He went to extremes to get his man. Look at the episode again. This is
> the difference between the idealistic and utopic view we got on TNG for
> instance. Would you see Picard go that far? Still, I look at this episode
> as a tangent to the series. The Maquis subplot to the overall story didn't
> live long.
There's idealistic and there's sociopathic. Using biological weapons
on a civilian population is the latter.
> > It might have been more interesting if Sisko had instead reexamined
> > his questionable and completely unauthorized decision to plunge the
> > Federation and the Klingon Empire into war in Way of the Warrior which
> > achieved nothing except the death of hundreds of thousands on both
> > sides and helped pave the way for the Dominion invasion to come.
>
> If I remember well, the Klingons wanted to attack Cardassia and were
> stopping ships from leaving DS9 because they were convinced that the
> leaders of Cardassia were actually changelings. Anyhow, Worf thought that
> this was merely Gowron's idea to fire up the Klingon's warrior lifestyle.
> It is called "Way of the Warrior" by the way. At this point, Cardassia was
> not in league with the Dominion. Anyway, rewatch those two episodes. I
> think you're missing something.
The Klingons wanted to attack Cardassia and Sisko on his own intiative
dragged the Federation into a war with the Klingon empire that cost
thousands and perhaps tens of thousands of lives. Unlike Moonlight,
his actions weren't really justifiable either.
> >> Anyhow,
> >> DS9 was a much more realistic portrayal of humanity.
> >
> > DS9 wasn't a portrait of humanity. It barely even had human
> > charachters in relation to TOS or TNG.
>
> Don't you know sci-fi uses aliens often times to explore human issues?
You're arguing that it was a 'more realistic portrait of humanity'
which it isn't. Arguing that it uses aliens to explore human issues is
another tack entirely.
> Whether it had to do with religion, politics, war, greed, sexism, love or
> hate, you could find it on DS9. It was so much more than the narrow view
> you have of it. Still we did have O'brien, Keiko, Kassidy, Sisko, Jake,
O'Brien and Keiko were TNG charachters. Kassidy was wasted. Sisko
turned out to be only half human. What this makes Jake is left as an
excercise for the reader.
> >> >we did not see our main
> >> > charachters worshipping aliens
> >>
> >> We didn't see this in DS9. We saw Bajorans doing this. As for
> >> Jadzia I showed you how that can be looked at in other ways. Yours
> >> is just one way. As to Sisko, he didn't worship the Prophets as
> >> such. In addition, the Prophets and the Pah Wraiths were shown to be
> >> "aliens" and not gods except to the Bajorans.
> >
> > We saw pretty much everyone reffering to them as 'Prophets' by the
> > end. Jadzia Dax herself pointed up the distinction between 'Wormhole
> > Aliens' and 'Prophets.' You didn't see Picard calling Q, God. Even
> > though Q wanted him to and was more powerful than any wormhole alien.
>
> You can't compare the two instances. First of all, the only ones who
> "worshipped" the Prophets were the Bajorans. Sisko had a unique
> relationship with them but even towards the end he really didn't follow
> what they wanted. He questioned them continuously. He married Kassidy
> even though Sarah didn't want him to, and so on. But he was destined to be
> the Emissary and be a Prophet himself in the end. Not at all the same as
> Picard and Q.
Accepting the premise of destiny is itself a religious value that has
no place in Science Fiction.
David Johnston
I'm not sure how your reply to him is relevant. "Basicly good guys"
is not the same thing as "pure".
idg
really nothing much else to add. The only thing that comes to mind is
that this show was such a rollicking ride for me, especially after the
first two seasons, that it actually rivalled sitting down with a great
book.
the other thing is that I completely agree that DS9 was about change.
and that is the reason why I deem it better than TNG and think that
it's THE BEST of all trek shows. every character in DS9 is a
protagonist. look at them at the beginning of the show, and then look
at them in What YOu Leave Behind. their story arc is truly, truly
riveting in what they have come through in the past seven years. Sisko
is now truly The Emissary - in his own mind and in reality. Kira will
now be the station commander and will have to be The Diplomat (hehe),
and she has been in love and lost that love and is now seasoned and
wise. JAdzia is dead, but Dax goes on in Ezri who is in love with Dr.
Bashir, who has been humbled by his experiences and failures. Worf
realizes his true destiny. Jake loses his father -- THE most important
person in his life but gains true adulthood and the perspective that
comes with it. Look at what happens to Quark, to Nog, to Odo, to
Dukat, to Wynn... and don't just look at the surface. dig deeper and
you'll see the true transformation in the characters. I could go on
but you get the picture. Every character, regular or recurring, has
had an enormous, deep-seated, and sustained sense of change in his
life and his character through the events on the show. Can we say that
about TNG? I don't think so. forget voyager. and TOS wasn't around
long enough. umm but yes, if you count the TOS movies then maybe you
could say they took up where the series left off. but it was still
really the Kirk-Bones-Spock show to a large extent.
DS9 worked its stuff with everyone -- whether regular and recurring.
how easy is that?! anyway, but this is what gives DS9 its value. you
guys who have doubts about DS9, watch it on TNN when it begins its run
-- you can't miss its power and magic. the stuff is mythic and just
plain incredible. it's like goddamned classic literature. it has its
misses, but it's going to stand the test of time. unlike TNG and a lot
of other trek material.
indrani.
"Theodoric of York, Medieval Barber" <theodori...@nospam.org> wrote in message news:<8fgp0vcbufgctfb08...@4ax.com>...
> On Fri, 27 Dec 2002 06:33:30 GMT, Gisele La Roche
> <gisele...@yahoo.com> wrote:
>
> >od...@bigfoot.com (O Deus) wrote in
> >news:c6784f8f.02122...@posting.google.com:
> >
> >>> OK. I do agree that the perception about DS9 was that it was a
> >>> non-event. but I still don't agree with the low quality bit, "red
> >>> contact lens demons" (really, the pah wraiths aka former Dukat)
> >>> notwithstanding. I mean, really, have you forgotten Troi flying
> >>> through the air crying "where ARE you?!" come on. TNG had its lion's
> >>> share of idiotic/low quality shows.
> >>
> >> There's no denying that. The problem is that DS9 committed itself,
> >> especially in the earlier and later seasons to story arcs on that poor
> >> material. By the time DS9's finale came around, we discovered that
> >> apparently the entire underlying purpose behind the seven years of DS9
> >> we'd been watching had been to get Sisko to prevent the red contact
> >> lens demons from opening the gateway to Bajoran hell and supposedly
> >> destroying the universe.
> >
> >Oh goodness, there's so much more to DS9 than that. See my other post
> >for a more elaborate argument on this. Also, for an even more detailed
> >look at DS9 go to:
> >
> >http://www.starfleetlibrary.com/ds9petition and read my tribute to DS9.
> >I'm not trying to promote the campaign in this post or tooting my own
> >horn. It's just that the tribute covers more easily the complexity of
> >DS9 than I could list here. It's rather long but read to the end. You
> >can skip the list of actors on the show and just go on reading as I talk
> >about the themes and ideas explored on the show. You have to look at DS9
> >like it was a multi-colored painting. What you describe above are only
> >the red patches. You have to look at all the colors of it. It's such a
> >deep mythology that it requires much more description than what you list
> >above. Now describe Voyager and you can do it in a paragraph, yes.
>
> I think there was also more of a richness of character in DS9 than in
> any of the other five series. Sisko was the most complex of the five
> leads (Picard ranks second), Dukat could've been more rounded, but he
> was more interesting than any other villain in the Trek canon, and
> Quark made for a fascinating side character. I also liked the way the
> Bajoran and Feringi cultures were drawn, and I liked Quark's
> resistance to change (the relationship with mother, having to deal
> with the threat of a union at his bar, etc.) Liked Garak, too.
> >
> >> The up side of arcs is that they give the series a novel like quality
> >> and that's their downside too, because a bad ending for a novel
> >> results in a bad novel. The more you commit to arcs, the harder it is
> >> to shrug off bad episodes the way TNG could, and the more you end up
> >> committing to continuing bad material like the red contact lens demons
> >> in serial form.
> >
> >That was just one part of the saga. You have to think of other things as
> >well. They were limited to a ten episode arc. I agree they could have
> >done more. Dukat could have been not only insane but more dangerous and
> >scary. Teri Farrell's (Jadzia) leaving the show meant they had to insert
> >(at the last minute practically) Nicole De Boer (Ezri) into the show.
> >This cut in to a lot of the final season. It wasn't the perfect ending
> >agreed but it was hardly "bad". Again, it's like looking at a painting.
> >We all see different things when we view one. It all depends on how
> >deeply you were into the show I think.
> >
> I know it's sort of a contrarian view, but I found much to like about
> the two hour finale. While there was something lacking in the final
> confrontation between Sisko and Dukat, I liked the resolution of the
> war arc, particularly the way the aftermath of the war was portrayed.
>
> >>> what DS9 lacked in razzle-dazzle
> >>> it made up with mythic passion and pathos and humor and an ability to
> >>> poke fun at itself and the whole franchise and genre, and the red
> >>> contact lenses didn't detract from that one bit, imo.
> >
> >Agreed!
> >
> >> And what it had in any of this doesn't even begin to offset having a
> >> recurring rat pack hologram who gives romantic advice to the crew,
> >> Garak falling in love with Dukat's daughter, the painfully nauseating
> >> Ferengi family comedies, the beeping helmet people who were supposed
> >> to be the new big threat to the Federation, the red contact lens
> >> demons, Dukat becoming a cartoonish lunatic, tiresome Bajoran rituals
> >> and half the crew seeming to convert to the Bajoran religion and so on
> >> and so forth
> >
> >Wow, you are skimming here. It's much deeper than that. Read the
> >tribute and let me know what you think, if you want of course.
>
> While he was a distraction and unnecessary, I wasn't that bothered by
> the James Darren character. I wouldn't have had him as a recurring
> character, but he wasn't quite Trek's Jar Jar Binks.
> >
> >> I'm not trying to beat up on DS9, I'm just pointing out that the
> >> series wasn't nearly as rosy as its fans like to claim.
> >
> >That's your opinion of course. I feel that way about Voyager and there
> >are a heck of a lot of Voyager fans who would disagree with me.....heh.
>
> I have to admit that I'm not a huge fan of the first couple of seasons
> of DS9; there are good eps in seasons one and two, but the show took a
> while to get its footing (this happened about the time Sisko went
> bald). DS9 did have its problems, but the writers were decent, and
> the characters were well drawn.
>
> VOY, OTOH, had potential and never really took off, largely thanks to
> lackluster writing. Not too far into VOY's run, I was feeling pretty
> sorry for Robert Picardo and Robert Beltran. By the end of the show's
> run, I was feeling sorry for everybody except Brannon Braga's
> girlfriend. You had gimmicks (the Borg kids and the Delta Flyer, for
> example) and rehashed plots. What's truly sad is, VOY had a good
> premise and a decent cast. Janeway could've been compelling, and the
> fact that she wasn't isn't something I blame Kate Mulgrew for. Same
> goes for most of the other characters (Chakotay, Tom Paris, Harry
> Kim). The only character who was consistently well drawn was the
> Doctor, and that was primarily Picardo's doing There are only maybe
> two or three standout VOY eps, and the overall quality of the show is
> the lowest of the five TV series. I really wanted to like VOY, too
> bad it couldn't have been better.
>
> >>> and don't for a
> >>> minute forget that it did give us some of the grittiest and best
> >>> action and battle sequences of any Trek. the Wolf 359 sequence in
> >>> Best of Both Worlds I was peanuts compared to the DS9 stuff we saw
> >>> every week in the 6th and 7th seasons.
> >
> >Agreed!
> >
> >> Most of the 6th and 7th season battle sequences were repetitive and
> >> uninteresting. Major defeats generally happened offscreen and were
> >> discussed by the charachters (oh last week Betazed was captured by the
> >> Dominion), aside from Rocks and Shoals most of the ground battles were
> >> unoriginal and cliched repetitions of WW2 and Vietnam War movies, a
> >> lot of the space battles relied on technobabble gimmicks, Angels
> >> climax was classic Deus Ex with actual gods making the rescue.
> >
> >Disagree!
>
> I disagree, also.
>
> >
> >> Ron Moore's Tacking Into the Wind actually showed what the Dominion
> >> war should have been, a greater focus on charachters and innovative
> >> storytelling.
> >
> >Just one of the many great writers on DS9. This was a character-driven
> >show however. It had a lot of action in the later season but that wasn't
> >the focus.
>
> I think the real focus of DS9 was the struggle of the main characters
> to come to terms with change and how they fit in with their
> surroundings. You had Sisko having to deal with being the Emissary,
> Odo having to deal with his identity as a changeling, Kira having to
> deal with her culture in the wake of a war and brutal occupation, and
> Quark having to deal with his culture and religion undergoing change.
> DS9 isn't the best of the five TV series (TNG holds that distinction),
> but it's a pretty close second, largely thanks to the complexity of
> the characters.
idg
> Gisele La Roche <gisele...@yahoo.com> wrote in message news:<Xns92F1C4F7A6Bgis...@66.185.95.104>...
> > that kept watching were well rewarded but it took effort to watch in the
> > early seasons. Not because it was bad but it takes time to get into a
> > character-driven series. It's easier to get into episodic and action-
> > driven shows at first if it's well done. It wasn't your typical sci-fi.
>
> Actually it was often was bad. Certainly in the first season. Witness
> 'If Wishes Were Horses', 'Babel' and 'Move Along Home.' Not to mention
> the endlessly tedious Bajoran religion. But then DS9 kept trying to
> reinvent itself and get back viewers. It brought in the Defiant to get
> away from being a purely station bound series, it brought in the
> Dominion as a big bad enemy, it brought in Worf and the Klingons as a
> move of desperation to get back some of TNG's audience. And time and
> time again it failed. The problem is that DS9 seemed to want to be
> Babylon 5 instead of Star Trek and that turned viewers off. Especially
> since there already was a Babylon 5 on the air.
yes but are you saying that babylon 5 had more viewers than DS9? I'm
not doubting you, just asking. I don't think the two ate audiences
away from each other. I think the same people tended to watch the two
shows. even if they hated each other and blamed each other for
"stealing" ideas and stuff.
> > Some
> > people didn't like DS9 because it wasn't an action show.
>
> DS9 had no shortage of action. DS9 had two wars and endless amounts of
> battle scenes ranging into the downright gruesome. I particularly
> could have done without the scene of a Jem'Haddar snapping a
> Cardassian's back over his knee.
well, call me bloodthirsty but I quite liked that kind of stuff. :)
> > They explored
> > cultures (Klingon, Cardassian, Bajoran, Ferengi, Trill, and so on).
>
> Well they explored the Bajorans in the earlier seasons until the
> audience got bored, eventually they brought back the Bajorans as pawns
> in a ridiculous Book of Revelations style plot.
true. and I agree with everything you said on this kind of stuff. but,
and this is a big but... it was kinda non-roddenberry-trek to see this
sort of quasi-religio-themes on DS9. it gave me a sense of the
unpredictability that was very much an integral part of DS9.
> > They
> > explored and developed the villains (the Founders, the Pah-Wraiths).
>
> We knew something about The Founders, we really knew nothing about the
> Pah Wraiths. Rosalind Chao turned in a great performance as a possesed
> Keiko but the producers decided that it would be much more terrifying
> if the people had red contact lenses and talked like the Exorcist. We
> never learned much about the Pah Wraiths except that they were evil in
> the most cliched sense, mainly because we were told it over and over
> again. We never learned much about the Prophets over and over again,
> except that they were good and we were told this over and over again
> too. There was no real proof of it though either.
agreed there, unfortunately. though I liked the introduction of Sisko
the Emissary's mother but she sort of fell by the wayside after her
introduction. that was a golden story arc. they should have explored
that more.
> > They explored relationships between the cultures and people. They didn't
> > explore the new ridged forehead villain or new space anomaly of the week.
>
> Yes aside from the Dominion, DS9 mainly imported TNG races like the
> Cardassians, Bajorans and Klingons and Ferengi and continued their
> storylines. DS9 was pretty bad at producing any original races.
huh? what about the changlings? Odo? the dominion? the vorta,
especially? but yes, I do concede that they brought in the TNG races
but they did not just rehash them. they explored them in MUCH greater
detail than TNG ever did. also, remember that in DS9 the spotlight was
often on the "other" -- meaning -- the recurring characters and their
travails than on the effect they had on the regular characters. this,
in my opinion, is the salient featuer of DS9. one that lifts it out of
the pile of other Trek shows.
> > The villains were equal in power to the good guys. Look at how the once,
> > creepy, scary Borg were wimped down on Voyager. DS9 fans just didn't
> > take to Voyager very well and so did not watch it when DS9 ended.
>
> Yes and look how Dukat was turned from an interesting charachter into
> a rambling lunatic against the best efforts of Alaimo, while Ira Behr
> helpfully explained that anyone who objected to this move liked Nazis.
I do agree with you here. One hundred percent. I feel so bad for Marc
Alaimo. what a thing to do to such a talented actor and the brilliant
character he helped create. it's unpardonable. Ira Behr and co. had a
golden opportunity to rewrite history in art form. they missed it
completely. and the worst of it is that they don't even seem to know
it. oh well.
indrani.
O Deus
> od...@bigfoot.com (O Deus) wrote in message news:<c6784f8f.02122...@posting.google.com>...
> > Actually it was often was bad. Certainly in the first season. Witness
> > 'If Wishes Were Horses', 'Babel' and 'Move Along Home.' Not to mention
> > the endlessly tedious Bajoran religion. But then DS9 kept trying to
> > reinvent itself and get back viewers. It brought in the Defiant to get
> > away from being a purely station bound series, it brought in the
> > Dominion as a big bad enemy, it brought in Worf and the Klingons as a
> > move of desperation to get back some of TNG's audience. And time and
> > time again it failed. The problem is that DS9 seemed to want to be
> > Babylon 5 instead of Star Trek and that turned viewers off. Especially
> > since there already was a Babylon 5 on the air.
>
> yes but are you saying that babylon 5 had more viewers than DS9? I'm
> not doubting you, just asking. I don't think the two ate audiences
> away from each other. I think the same people tended to watch the two
> shows. even if they hated each other and blamed each other for
> "stealing" ideas and stuff.
No DS9 remained well ahead of B5 in the ratings, but then Star Trek
had a huge and well enstablished fandom in place for decades before B5
went on the air and it was better known. Undoubtedly there was a good
deal of overlap between audiences but the B5 connection damaged DS9's
status and the SciFi crowd didn't start praising DS9 until B5 was well
off the air.
> > > They explored
> > > cultures (Klingon, Cardassian, Bajoran, Ferengi, Trill, and so on).
> >
> > Well they explored the Bajorans in the earlier seasons until the
> > audience got bored, eventually they brought back the Bajorans as pawns
> > in a ridiculous Book of Revelations style plot.
>
> true. and I agree with everything you said on this kind of stuff. but,
> and this is a big but... it was kinda non-roddenberry-trek to see this
> sort of quasi-religio-themes on DS9. it gave me a sense of the
> unpredictability that was very much an integral part of DS9.
Except it really wasn't all that unpredictable, especially the climax
in the fire caves which employed every possible movie cliche.
> > > They
> > > explored and developed the villains (the Founders, the Pah-Wraiths).
> >
> > We knew something about The Founders, we really knew nothing about the
> > Pah Wraiths. Rosalind Chao turned in a great performance as a possesed
> > Keiko but the producers decided that it would be much more terrifying
> > if the people had red contact lenses and talked like the Exorcist. We
> > never learned much about the Pah Wraiths except that they were evil in
> > the most cliched sense, mainly because we were told it over and over
> > again. We never learned much about the Prophets over and over again,
> > except that they were good and we were told this over and over again
> > too. There was no real proof of it though either.
>
> agreed there, unfortunately. though I liked the introduction of Sisko
> the Emissary's mother but she sort of fell by the wayside after her
> introduction. that was a golden story arc. they should have explored
> that more.
They should have explored a lot of things more.
> > > They explored relationships between the cultures and people. They didn't
> > > explore the new ridged forehead villain or new space anomaly of the week.
> >
> > Yes aside from the Dominion, DS9 mainly imported TNG races like the
> > Cardassians, Bajorans and Klingons and Ferengi and continued their
> > storylines. DS9 was pretty bad at producing any original races.
>
> huh? what about the changlings? Odo? the dominion? the vorta,
> especially?
Which is why I started out by saying, 'aside from the Dominion'
> but yes, I do concede that they brought in the TNG races
> but they did not just rehash them. they explored them in MUCH greater
> detail than TNG ever did. also, remember that in DS9 the spotlight was
> often on the "other" -- meaning -- the recurring characters and their
> travails than on the effect they had on the regular characters. this,
> in my opinion, is the salient featuer of DS9. one that lifts it out of
> the pile of other Trek shows.
I don't know. The DS9 Klingons were basically the TNG Klingons but
with even less complexity and depth. The Romulans were there to cause
problems, there was none of the complexity of The Defector. The
Cardassians were explored and done justice to, but in many ways I
preffered the TNG Bajorans without all the religious mumbo jumbo but
with a focus on the social problems. Ds9 sometimes did that early on
in episodes like Progress but then fell by the wayside for more red
contact lens demon stories and supernatural nonesense.
> > > The villains were equal in power to the good guys. Look at how the once,
> > > creepy, scary Borg were wimped down on Voyager. DS9 fans just didn't
> > > take to Voyager very well and so did not watch it when DS9 ended.
> >
> > Yes and look how Dukat was turned from an interesting charachter into
> > a rambling lunatic against the best efforts of Alaimo, while Ira Behr
> > helpfully explained that anyone who objected to this move liked Nazis.
>
> I do agree with you here. One hundred percent. I feel so bad for Marc
> Alaimo. what a thing to do to such a talented actor and the brilliant
> character he helped create. it's unpardonable. Ira Behr and co. had a
> golden opportunity to rewrite history in art form. they missed it
> completely. and the worst of it is that they don't even seem to know
> it. oh well.
Behr was always DS9's weakest writer and he never really had a clue
about Star Trek or Science Fiction. Alaimo certainly saw the work he
had put into creating a charachter trashed towards the end, and it's
interesting that though he'd done two TNG episodes, he hasn't shown up
in Star Trek since DS9's end.
Gisele La Roche
news:6556f13.03010...@posting.google.com:
> YOu know what? you guys have been so eloquent about DS9 that I have
> really nothing much else to add. The only thing that comes to mind is
> that this show was such a rollicking ride for me, especially after the
> first two seasons, that it actually rivalled sitting down with a great
> book.
<snip some great stuff>
Well said Indrani!
Gisele
Gisele La Roche
od...@bigfoot.com (O Deus) wrote in
news:c6784f8f.02123...@posting.google.com:
>> First of all, the episodes you list above all end in a positive way.
>> They all reaffirm the "goodness" of Starfleet and the Federation. In
>> "Conscience of the King" I realize it wasn't so rosy an ending but
>> Kirk still did the right thing.
>
> That certainly isn't true of A Private Little War or Errand of Mercy
> which both end with Kirk questioning his values and his decisions.
But it ended in a positive way nonetheless. Still, OVERALL, the way
Starfleet and the Federation were portrayed left fans thinking that the two
could do no wrong. There were isolated situations, captains or whatever
that were shown to be bad but OVERALL, Starfleet and the Fed. were seen as
good guys to look up to. In DS9, we got a more realistic portrayal of
government (the Federation) and the military aspect of Starfleet.
Still, Roddenberry's view of the future was one without war. He wanted
Enterprise to be a ship of exploration (even with families aboard). It was
a more utopic view.
>> In DS9, we see that governments are not so perfect. Things are
>> much more realistic and reflect a lot more the reality out there.
>
> When was the UFP perfect in TOS or TNG? We had a long parade of
> corrupt, bullying and incompetent Admirals and Ambassadors. We have a
> Starfleet coup attempt. Corrupt Admirals played a major role in TNG
> with episodes like Pegasus and Star Trek Insurrection in which the
> Federation makes a deal to take away the homes of the Baku in exchange
> for life extension.
You can't really count Insurrection as Roddenberry wasn't around for that.
We are talking about Roddenberry's utopic view of the future and how it was
expressed in Star Trek TOS and TNG. As to the Pegasus ep, was Picard the
bad guy? How did the episode end? Were any of the Enterprise crew ever
shown to be bad in any way (unless they were possessed or something)? Did
any have flaws (ok Barklay did)? The Federation and Starfleet had their
share of odd balls but OVERALL it was shown to be idealistically good.
>> Politics
>> are much more realistic on DS9. Think of the ep where Quark sells
>> arms or the one where Rom creates the bar association and so on.
>
> Not really. Quark's change of heart is cliched and telegraphed. In
> point of fact Quark never seemed to have moral qualms about engaging
> in activities which cost lives before.
Elaborate please... but as far as I remember, Quark did things that were
illegal. Which cost lives? I don't think so.
> So like Sisko in Pale Moonlight
> it's a showcased moral crisis.
>
> And do you really think it's 'realistic' that Rom became the leader of
> Ferenginar and had no trouble converting the place to a liberal
> democracy?
Things had already been done before Rom became Nagus. Zek had made
changes. In the last ep where Brunt thinks Quark will become Nagus he
cites all the changes that have occurred (mainly due to Ishka's influence
on Zek). Quark is dumbfounded and pledges to change things back. Rom
isn't alone either. His mother is very much involved in the politics of
Ferenginar.
>> >That, like much of DS9 including its insistence that its
>> > shapeshifters were the only ones in existance though we've seen
>
>> > otherwise numerous times, flies in the face of basic Star Trek
>> > continuity.
>>
>> Odo and the Founders were unique in their own right. Odo thought he
>> was the only one who was like that. I agree we've seen other types
>> of shapeshifters but not like the Dominion ones. Still now you're
>> nitpicking.
>
> The claim was repeated that they were unique because they were
> shapeshifters, because they could shapeshift. Endless examples prove
> that this isn't the case. And this isn't a minor point, it was
> repeated over and over again and served as a major plot point for the
> series.
No, it was noted that they were not SOLIDS. There's a difference. They
and Odo revelled in the fact that they were not trapped in one body. They
had the Link. They were not like the solids. That's what was emphasized.
>> >> There is no Section 31.
>> >
>> > There never was and there still isn't.
>>
>> Why because it makes the Federation less of a utopic, idealistic and
>> frankly unreal entity?
>
> So the Federation is unreal unless there's some secret police force
> operating behind the scenes using tactics more reminiscent of Get
> Smart than a serious inteligence agency?
The Federation of TOS and TNG were too goody goody in my opinion, too
idealistic, too utopic and yes unreal. Section 31 makes sense. Again,
it's a reflection of the U.S. government. You mention A Private Little
War, that was a comment on the Vietnam war. In DS9 we get to see some of
the workings of such an organization as the Federation. It's a reflection
of today.
>> But they are shown to be good guys nonetheless. Overall the attitude
>> of fans towards the Vulcans has always been that they are extremely
>> good. Why do you think that so many fans don't like how the Vulcans
>> are portrayed on Enterprise. So many were convinced (mostly by
>> Spock's portrayal) that Vulcans never lie and so on. It's been the
>> overall view of many fans that Vulcans are idealistic, utopic good
>> guys.
>
> I've demonstrated above that they're shown to be no such thing, but
> that they have nuance and complexity. As for Vulcans lying, that issue
> was covered long before Enterprise. And Vulcans do indeed mislead,
> they just tend not to lie directly. A tradition T'Pol has tended to
> keep up.
Well that's not how fans interpreted it. The OVERALL values and goodness
of Vulcans was always accepted.
>> > This is realistic and a nuanced view of an alien species. By
>> > contrast DS9 seemed to have a pathological hatred for Vulcans, Take
>> > Me Out To The Holosuite would have been outright bigotry and race
>> > baiting if it had involved a human race. But then this was similar
>> > to DS9's treatment of the Ferengi.
>>
>> Lol you are clutching at straws. I think the portrayal on DS9 again
>> showed a variation of Vulcans that most would not have thought of.
>> It showed that they weren't "perfect".
>
> Umm...it showed that Sisko and DS9's producers rabidly hated them.
>But
> Season 7 seemed to go in for Vulcan bashing with that silly Vulcan
> serial killer episode.
It showed that Vulcans weren't perfect. You see things that aren't there.
Why would DS9 producers "hate" Vulcans? That's silly. They made Vulcans
more realistic. As to the serial killer, why couldn't it be a Vulcan?
>> >> Overall, from a production standpoint, Roddenberry did not want
>> >> the Federation or Starfleet to be at war like we had in DS9
>> >
>> > Because it was a show about exploration, not a series of repetitive
>> > battle scenes which is what DS9's final seasons turned into.
>>
>> You know I'm starting to think you didn't watch DS9 all that much.
>> It was so much more than that. It dealt with the war, yes, but it
>> dealt with what the characters were going through.
>
> I've seen pretty much every episode. And it didn't deal with the war
> in any way beyond the surface cliches.
Wow, then you weren't watching like I was. It's obvious you didn't like
the show. You like TNG and TOS. That will color your impressions of the
show more than anything else. But there's nothing wrong with that. We all
have our likes and dislikes.
>> >We don't
>> > need to go into space for that, we can fight battles right here. We
>> > can't explore a black hole right here.
>>
>> But DS9 was not a Starfleet ship. It was a space station with a
>> myriad of things going on on it. It featured a large variety of
>> cultures and characters. It wasn't TNG or TOS.
>
> It was supposed to deal with the Gamma Quadrant, instead it mostly
> ended up dealing with the Alpha Quadrant. It was a failure of
> imagination.
It didn't explore some new gimmicky ridge-headed alien or spatial anomaly
of the week, no. TNG had done that and done it well. So had TOS. DS9 was
a character driven show. Look at the characters from the beginning of the
series and at the end. Look at the secondary characters. It's not the
same premise or show as TOS and TNG. It explored cultures. Ok, we are
starting to repeat ourselves now. Voyager went back to making the show
more action-oriented and you know how that went. All they could do was
rehash what had already been done. DS9 was/is unique and original in its
approach.
>> But Sisko is well aware that what he is doing is not ethical. To
>> trick the Romulans into the war is not something I think Picard would
>> even think of doing. It wouldn't fit in with the way he was
>> portrayed as the quintessential Starfleet captain. Kirk, it depends
>> but I doubt that Roddenberry would have wanted Kirk or Picard
>> involved in an all out war to begin with.
>
> Depends on the situation. Sisko didn't do anything all that far out of
> bounds. And he'd done much worse things before. The worst thing he did
> in this episode was plant misinformation to the Romulans. Boo Hoo.
> Kirk could have done that over his lunch break.
Lol, you are funny. Yeah, I think Kirk might have done something similar
to Sisko, we'll never know but not Picard.
>> >Considering that Sisko had already used
>> > biological weapons on civilians in For The Uniform and
>> > congratulated himself on being the bad guy, Sisko suddenly finding
>> > his morals came off as laughable hypocritical.
>>
>> He went to extremes to get his man. Look at the episode again. This
>> is the difference between the idealistic and utopic view we got on
>> TNG for instance. Would you see Picard go that far? Still, I look
>> at this episode as a tangent to the series. The Maquis subplot to
>> the overall story didn't live long.
>
> There's idealistic and there's sociopathic. Using biological weapons
> on a civilian population is the latter.
Yes but reread what I said above.
>> If I remember well, the Klingons wanted to attack Cardassia and were
>> stopping ships from leaving DS9 because they were convinced that the
>> leaders of Cardassia were actually changelings. Anyhow, Worf thought
>> that this was merely Gowron's idea to fire up the Klingon's warrior
>> lifestyle. It is called "Way of the Warrior" by the way. At this
>> point, Cardassia was not in league with the Dominion. Anyway,
>> rewatch those two episodes. I think you're missing something.
>
> The Klingons wanted to attack Cardassia and Sisko on his own intiative
> dragged the Federation into a war with the Klingon empire that cost
> thousands and perhaps tens of thousands of lives. Unlike Moonlight,
> his actions weren't really justifiable either.
Rewatch the episodes. There's a bit more to it than that.
>> >> Anyhow,
>> >> DS9 was a much more realistic portrayal of humanity.
>> >
>> > DS9 wasn't a portrait of humanity. It barely even had human
>> > charachters in relation to TOS or TNG.
>>
>> Don't you know sci-fi uses aliens often times to explore human
>> issues?
>
> You're arguing that it was a 'more realistic portrait of humanity'
> which it isn't. Arguing that it uses aliens to explore human issues is
> another tack entirely.
Ok, but they did have humans on the show. How many were on TOS? How many
were on TNG? How many on DS9? Not that much difference but you also have
to look at how aliens are often examples of humans. Well, heck, they all
are. But look at the humans and how much more realistic they were.
>> Whether it had to do with religion, politics, war, greed, sexism,
>> love or hate, you could find it on DS9. It was so much more than the
>> narrow view you have of it. Still we did have O'brien, Keiko,
>> Kassidy, Sisko, Jake,
>
> O'Brien and Keiko were TNG charachters.
And how developed were they on TNG? Please now...
>Kassidy was wasted. Sisko
> turned out to be only half human. What this makes Jake is left as an
> excercise for the reader.
Hardly. There's so much more to them. Look at them at the beginning of
the show and at the end. You have a very narrow view of the show.
>> You can't compare the two instances. First of all, the only ones who
>> "worshipped" the Prophets were the Bajorans. Sisko had a unique
>> relationship with them but even towards the end he really didn't
>> follow what they wanted. He questioned them continuously. He
>> married Kassidy even though Sarah didn't want him to, and so on. But
>> he was destined to be the Emissary and be a Prophet himself in the
>> end. Not at all the same as Picard and Q.
>
> Accepting the premise of destiny is itself a religious value that has
> no place in Science Fiction.
Now you are just arguing to argue.
Take care,
Gisele
idg
> indr...@yahoo.com (idg) wrote in message news:<6556f13.03010...@posting.google.com>...
> > od...@bigfoot.com (O Deus) wrote in message news:<c6784f8f.02122...@posting.google.com>...
>
> > > Actually it was often was bad. Certainly in the first season. Witness
> > > 'If Wishes Were Horses', 'Babel' and 'Move Along Home.' Not to mention
> > > the endlessly tedious Bajoran religion. But then DS9 kept trying to
> > > reinvent itself and get back viewers. It brought in the Defiant to get
> > > away from being a purely station bound series, it brought in the
> > > Dominion as a big bad enemy, it brought in Worf and the Klingons as a
> > > move of desperation to get back some of TNG's audience. And time and
> > > time again it failed. The problem is that DS9 seemed to want to be
> > > Babylon 5 instead of Star Trek and that turned viewers off. Especially
> > > since there already was a Babylon 5 on the air.
> >
> > yes but are you saying that babylon 5 had more viewers than DS9? I'm
> > not doubting you, just asking. I don't think the two ate audiences
> > away from each other. I think the same people tended to watch the two
> > shows. even if they hated each other and blamed each other for
> > "stealing" ideas and stuff.
>
> No DS9 remained well ahead of B5 in the ratings, but then Star Trek
> had a huge and well enstablished fandom in place for decades before B5
> went on the air and it was better known. Undoubtedly there was a good
> deal of overlap between audiences but the B5 connection damaged DS9's
> status and the SciFi crowd didn't start praising DS9 until B5 was well
> off the air.
agreed. it did damage the image of DS9. they should have been more
careful. I still remember the heated debates on the DS9 newsgroup with
Ron Moore right in the middle of the JMS comparisons. it was only
because it was Moore and not some other lesser-humored writer that we
actually were treated to some reasoned logic as to what happened.
> > > > They explored
> > > > cultures (Klingon, Cardassian, Bajoran, Ferengi, Trill, and so on).
> > >
> > > Well they explored the Bajorans in the earlier seasons until the
> > > audience got bored, eventually they brought back the Bajorans as pawns
> > > in a ridiculous Book of Revelations style plot.
> >
> > true. and I agree with everything you said on this kind of stuff. but,
> > and this is a big but... it was kinda non-roddenberry-trek to see this
> > sort of quasi-religio-themes on DS9. it gave me a sense of the
> > unpredictability that was very much an integral part of DS9.
>
> Except it really wasn't all that unpredictable, especially the climax
> in the fire caves which employed every possible movie cliche.
Yes, well, What You Leave Behind was not the best way to end the show
and I agree about the fire cave stuff. I was watching with my mouth
hanging open in aghast disbelief. but I don't agree that most of the
show was like that. It wasn't.
> > > > They
> > > > explored and developed the villains (the Founders, the Pah-Wraiths).
> > >
> > > We knew something about The Founders, we really knew nothing about the
> > > Pah Wraiths. Rosalind Chao turned in a great performance as a possesed
> > > Keiko but the producers decided that it would be much more terrifying
> > > if the people had red contact lenses and talked like the Exorcist. We
> > > never learned much about the Pah Wraiths except that they were evil in
> > > the most cliched sense, mainly because we were told it over and over
> > > again. We never learned much about the Prophets over and over again,
> > > except that they were good and we were told this over and over again
> > > too. There was no real proof of it though either.
> >
> > agreed there, unfortunately. though I liked the introduction of Sisko
> > the Emissary's mother but she sort of fell by the wayside after her
> > introduction. that was a golden story arc. they should have explored
> > that more.
>
> They should have explored a lot of things more.
and that's my point: they did. more than most other treks have done so
far.
> > > > They explored relationships between the cultures and people. They didn't
> > > > explore the new ridged forehead villain or new space anomaly of the week.
> > >
> > > Yes aside from the Dominion, DS9 mainly imported TNG races like the
> > > Cardassians, Bajorans and Klingons and Ferengi and continued their
> > > storylines. DS9 was pretty bad at producing any original races.
> >
> > huh? what about the changlings? Odo? the dominion? the vorta,
> > especially?
>
> Which is why I started out by saying, 'aside from the Dominion'
>
> > but yes, I do concede that they brought in the TNG races
> > but they did not just rehash them. they explored them in MUCH greater
> > detail than TNG ever did. also, remember that in DS9 the spotlight was
> > often on the "other" -- meaning -- the recurring characters and their
> > travails than on the effect they had on the regular characters. this,
> > in my opinion, is the salient featuer of DS9. one that lifts it out of
> > the pile of other Trek shows.
>
> I don't know. The DS9 Klingons were basically the TNG Klingons but
> with even less complexity and depth. The Romulans were there to cause
> problems, there was none of the complexity of The Defector.
No but the Romulans had less focus on them in DS9 than did the
Klingons and the Cardassians. the problem with the Klingons were that
they were Ron Moore's pet race and he tended to show them to us thru
his personal lens. so we had all the wargames scenario's for boys
etc...
The
> Cardassians were explored and done justice to, but in many ways I
> preffered the TNG Bajorans without all the religious mumbo jumbo but
> with a focus on the social problems. Ds9 sometimes did that early on
> in episodes like Progress but then fell by the wayside for more red
> contact lens demon stories and supernatural nonesense.
Yes, but tell me this. do you really think that in TNG the focus was
on these races and their problems etc? I found that TNG dealt more
with how these races and characters affected the TNG regulars. DS9
concentrated on the races. that made the difference to me.
> > > > The villains were equal in power to the good guys. Look at how the once,
> > > > creepy, scary Borg were wimped down on Voyager. DS9 fans just didn't
> > > > take to Voyager very well and so did not watch it when DS9 ended.
> > >
> > > Yes and look how Dukat was turned from an interesting charachter into
> > > a rambling lunatic against the best efforts of Alaimo, while Ira Behr
> > > helpfully explained that anyone who objected to this move liked Nazis.
> >
> > I do agree with you here. One hundred percent. I feel so bad for Marc
> > Alaimo. what a thing to do to such a talented actor and the brilliant
> > character he helped create. it's unpardonable. Ira Behr and co. had a
> > golden opportunity to rewrite history in art form. they missed it
> > completely. and the worst of it is that they don't even seem to know
> > it. oh well.
>
> Behr was always DS9's weakest writer and he never really had a clue
> about Star Trek or Science Fiction. Alaimo certainly saw the work he
> had put into creating a charachter trashed towards the end, and it's
> interesting that though he'd done two TNG episodes, he hasn't shown up
> in Star Trek since DS9's end.
I guess he doesn't have the energy to fight closeminded non-creativity
any more. he's a great actor and Dukat (up until "Sacrifice of
Angels") is an incredible, multilayered character.
indrani.
David E. Powell
news:c6784f8f.03010...@posting.google.com...
What about at DS9's start? There was a period where DS9 was out and B5
wasn't yet - and some time between the B5 pilot movie "The Gathering" and
the dawn.. er, beginning of the Babylon 5 series run.
> > > > They explored
> > > > cultures (Klingon, Cardassian, Bajoran, Ferengi, Trill, and so on).
> > >
> > > Well they explored the Bajorans in the earlier seasons until the
> > > audience got bored, eventually they brought back the Bajorans as pawns
> > > in a ridiculous Book of Revelations style plot.
> >
> > true. and I agree with everything you said on this kind of stuff. but,
> > and this is a big but... it was kinda non-roddenberry-trek to see this
> > sort of quasi-religio-themes on DS9. it gave me a sense of the
> > unpredictability that was very much an integral part of DS9.
>
> Except it really wasn't all that unpredictable, especially the climax
> in the fire caves which employed every possible movie cliche.
The wormhole aliens were fun. The one with them and Quark was one of my
faves. It says something about Shimmerman that he was able to make his
character win in so many scenes and arguments when you might not know he
could with the dialogue. Almost like he was the capitalist succeeding
despite the Trek-esque social propa.. er, commentary.
> > > > They
> > > > explored and developed the villains (the Founders, the Pah-Wraiths).
> > >
> > > We knew something about The Founders, we really knew nothing about the
> > > Pah Wraiths. Rosalind Chao turned in a great performance as a possesed
> > > Keiko but the producers decided that it would be much more terrifying
> > > if the people had red contact lenses and talked like the Exorcist. We
> > > never learned much about the Pah Wraiths except that they were evil in
> > > the most cliched sense, mainly because we were told it over and over
> > > again. We never learned much about the Prophets over and over again,
> > > except that they were good and we were told this over and over again
> > > too. There was no real proof of it though either.
> >
> > agreed there, unfortunately. though I liked the introduction of Sisko
> > the Emissary's mother but she sort of fell by the wayside after her
> > introduction. that was a golden story arc. they should have explored
> > that more.
>
> They should have explored a lot of things more.
I agree.. I am going to comment on this later on in the post..
> > > > They explored relationships between the cultures and people. They
didn't
> > > > explore the new ridged forehead villain or new space anomaly of the
week.
> > >
> > > Yes aside from the Dominion, DS9 mainly imported TNG races like the
> > > Cardassians, Bajorans and Klingons and Ferengi and continued their
> > > storylines. DS9 was pretty bad at producing any original races.
> >
> > huh? what about the changlings? Odo? the dominion? the vorta,
> > especially?
>
> Which is why I started out by saying, 'aside from the Dominion'
What happened to those Tosk things that looked like Jem"Hadar, that O'Brien
was cool with?
> > but yes, I do concede that they brought in the TNG races
> > but they did not just rehash them. they explored them in MUCH greater
> > detail than TNG ever did. also, remember that in DS9 the spotlight was
> > often on the "other" -- meaning -- the recurring characters and their
> > travails than on the effect they had on the regular characters. this,
> > in my opinion, is the salient featuer of DS9. one that lifts it out of
> > the pile of other Trek shows.
>
> I don't know. The DS9 Klingons were basically the TNG Klingons but
> with even less complexity and depth. The Romulans were there to cause
> problems, there was none of the complexity of The Defector. The
> Cardassians were explored and done justice to, but in many ways I
> preffered the TNG Bajorans without all the religious mumbo jumbo but
> with a focus on the social problems. Ds9 sometimes did that early on
> in episodes like Progress but then fell by the wayside for more red
> contact lens demon stories and supernatural nonesense.
Or "Duet." That was cool. Also a trilogy they did at the end of the first
season I think.
> > > > The villains were equal in power to the good guys. Look at how the
once,
> > > > creepy, scary Borg were wimped down on Voyager. DS9 fans just
didn't
> > > > take to Voyager very well and so did not watch it when DS9 ended.
> > >
> > > Yes and look how Dukat was turned from an interesting charachter into
> > > a rambling lunatic against the best efforts of Alaimo, while Ira Behr
> > > helpfully explained that anyone who objected to this move liked Nazis.
> >
> > I do agree with you here. One hundred percent. I feel so bad for Marc
> > Alaimo. what a thing to do to such a talented actor and the brilliant
> > character he helped create. it's unpardonable. Ira Behr and co. had a
> > golden opportunity to rewrite history in art form. they missed it
> > completely. and the worst of it is that they don't even seem to know
> > it. oh well.
>
> Behr was always DS9's weakest writer and he never really had a clue
> about Star Trek or Science Fiction. Alaimo certainly saw the work he
> had put into creating a charachter trashed towards the end, and it's
> interesting that though he'd done two TNG episodes, he hasn't shown up
> in Star Trek since DS9's end.
AMEN! I have always found a complex and multifaceted antagonist character so
much more interesting and compelling than a one-dimensional one in this
regard. If one can understand a little of the madness, it makes the lesson
of how to avoid/recognize it deeper. But while we are on the way Cardi
characters ended up - let's talk about Elim Garak.
Now, remember his GF got killed. Remember that like three or so episodes
later, he is MAKING DAX A WEDDING DRESS and this loss of his girlfriend is
not even mentioned. The scene was so damn sad without even mentioning it -
if you had followed the story, but Dax is all grins in it, which makes one
wonder really.... then he goes and gets all rah rah with no problems HELPING
THE GUY THAT KILLED HER and Kira has nothing to say about the situation
either - A WOMAN WHO KNOWS ABOUT PERSONAL BEEFS AND THEIR RELATION TO DUTY
QUITE WELL says nothing. Not to mention that he really doesn't do too much
after except give some patriotic speech and follow in the footsteps of the
GUY THAT SHOT HIS GIRLFRIEND DEADER THAN HOMO HABILIS. I was so waiting for
the war to be over and Garak just to backshoot Damar or something and say
something cold. I was so waiting for him to go off like John Kelly did in
Tom Clancy's novel "Without Remorse," where a former SEAL goes after his
girlfriend's killers, or like Sly Stallone in Nighthawks after his partner
gets hurt. I was so waiting for them to go all out with the Garak I really
loved, the guy you could drop into a Jack Higgins or John LeCarre novel
without missing a beat, and start screwing people over and waxing asses.
What happened to the guy from "Second Skin," or the guy that whacked a
Romulan to get them into the war on his own side? Hell, I think Andy
Robinson was one of the best actors they had, or could have had. The fact
that as a commited pacifist he can play a vengeful, driven type of character
so well speaks tons about his acting ability. Either seeing more of that
explored or seeing some more convincing "turn" to a nicer guy type after the
war - Imagine Robinson getting to showcase some of his personal convictions
in such a way - would both have been nice to see.
As it was, they fit him in, and they had a lot to fit in, but a couple lines
here and there could have provided a lot of gold. I keep thinking about that
wedding dress scene. A couple lines for Robinson and Farrell there, with the
way they could deliver them, could have given that whole scene a ton of
timbre and atmosphere, and a change in mood for an undercurrent in the midst
of an otherwise all happy episode, which Babylon 5 did quite well a lot of
times - and imagine if Bashir had been there as well. Or just
watching/listening from the shadows as Dax and Garak talk. With the upcoming
departure of Farrell, the Bashir/Dax element, and Garak's recent loss, all
the territory they could have brought into that....
Gisele La Roche
adding that newsgroup makes me wonder if your post is legit but here goes.
"David E. Powell" <David_Po...@msn.com> wrote in
news:OxGK#b#sCHA.1616@cpimsnntpa03:
> What about at DS9's start? There was a period where DS9 was out and B5
> wasn't yet - and some time between the B5 pilot movie "The Gathering"
> and the dawn.. er, beginning of the Babylon 5 series run.
DS9 at first wasn't praised. It was called "Deep Sleep Nine"......heh.
But at the end of the series, it was praised as the best written and acted
Trek of the Trek series by many critics (ie. from magazines like TV Guide
for instance).
> The wormhole aliens were fun. The one with them and Quark was one of
> my faves. It says something about Shimmerman that he was able to make
> his character win in so many scenes and arguments when you might not
> know he could with the dialogue. Almost like he was the capitalist
> succeeding despite the Trek-esque social propa.. er, commentary.
Lol, I thought they both promoted and at the same time satirized the
excesses of Capitalism in this show. I can remember the one where Ishka
tells Quark in front of Yelgrun (the Vorta) that he doesn't have a
diversified investment portfolio. Lol, good advice (to have one) for
investors. Quark was also seen as a smart businessman except when he was
selling arms. Other than that he may have made some not too legal deals
but that was the way DS9 was. You shouldn't look at the good guys too
closely lest you see their flaws. In the end these were richly developed
characters for the most part.
>> Behr was always DS9's weakest writer and he never really had a clue
>> about Star Trek or Science Fiction. Alaimo certainly saw the work he
>> had put into creating a charachter trashed towards the end, and it's
>> interesting that though he'd done two TNG episodes, he hasn't shown
>> up in Star Trek since DS9's end.
>
> AMEN! I have always found a complex and multifaceted antagonist
> character so much more interesting and compelling than a
> one-dimensional one in this regard. If one can understand a little of
> the madness, it makes the lesson of how to avoid/recognize it deeper.
> But while we are on the way Cardi characters ended up - let's talk
> about Elim Garak.
I think the way Dukat was portrayed in the end was different from anything
we'd seen in Trek before. He may have had moments where he was a "good"
guy but what he'd done to Bajorans during the occupation can't be ignored
or forgotten. Kira or anyone else never warmed to him and there's a reason
for it. The audience was aware that Dukat wasn't being sincere somehow but
wasn't sure. Most of the characters on DS9 had something that made them
less than perfect.
By acknowledging Ziyal's existence, Dukat lost his wife and children.
Ziyal was all he had. She was the only one that cared about him. When she
died, it changed him. The evil within him that had been always there took
over. The Cardassians were well aware of the Orbs and their power. They
were aware of the Prophets. Dukat using and then joining the Pah Wraiths
to try to destroy the Prophets and especially Sisko the Emissary makes
sense. It fits in well with his background. Bad guys joining forces also
makes sense. The whole of DS9 was about good vs evil but where good and
evil were in shades of grey not black and white. Very classic in its
approach but of course there was so much more to the show than this. There
were so many layers and archetypes to be found in DS9.
As to Ira Steven Behr, I think he was one of the greats of Trek. Look at
the eps he's written over the years: TNG's "Yesterday's Enterprise",
"Qpid", DS9's "The Homecoming", the first of the trilogy, "Rules of
Acquisition" which Ira invented, "The Jem'Hadar" introducing the Dominion,
"Past Tense I and II" which he co-wrote, "The Way of the Warrior" I and II,
again co-writing, "Little Green Men" one of the best Ferengi eps, "Bar
Association", "Body Parts", "Trials and Tribble-ations" co-written, "In
Purgatory's Shadow", "Call to Arms" co-written, "A time to Stand", "Far
Beyond the Stars" co-written, "What You Leave Behind" I and II, co-written
and so many more.
Behr was one of Trek's best writers!
As to Garak, I think he knew that Damar was Cardassia's only hope which is
why he didn't take his revenge on him. He also probably thought that Damar
was just doing his job killing someone who was a collaborator with the
enemy. But mostly I think it's because he saw Damar as a leader Cardassia
needed.
Gisele
Fred Flintstone
--
Keine Probleme, Nur Lösungen!
http://www.dwacon.com
David E. Powell
news:LFOR9.100057$I23.6...@news1.east.cox.net...
> Amen... Behr deserves much respect for his work.
The Amen was to the nits of the last season resolution of Dukat and Garak -
not so much a slam on ISB. Still, patriotism or no, I was sort of suprised
by Garak's, and the stuff on Dukat at the end was quite a tangent.