The IMDB daily news has the story. (The links change every day, so what you’ll be looking for starting tomorrow will be the archive for April 22, 2003, and it’s the second entry under “Studio Brief.”) Patrick Stewart is quoted as saying “I’ve probably said goodbye to Picard forever now.” Sherry Lansing, Paramount chairperson, says that the Star Trek “fan base has in some way shrunk.” Before we blame it all on Berman and Braga, we should note that the theatrical performance of Star Trek: Nemisis, which came out days before Lord of the Rings: The Two Towers, was one of the keys to this analysis.
Absence makes the heart grow fonder….
Consider the lag between the end of TOS and the first Trek movie. Those years were filled with reruns where fans and soon-to-be fans could hone their Kirk impressions to impress each other at cons and Trek was just a geeky affectation by those in the know.
Now Trek is on 24/7, new shows have to compete with the old and the Vegas strip show. There are no new engaging statements about society because everythings already been said by much better actors on a tenth of the budget.
Trek has gone from ‘space western’ social commentary to techno-babble gee-whiz effects to in-your-face b00bz!!
What Trek desperately needs is to be off the air for a decade. Perhaps then people will begin to long for new adventures from some new talent.
Finally! Let some other actors have a chance!
This leaves the stage wide open for Sean Connery!
It is unavoidable
I have been, since I was about 9-10 years, an avid Star Trek fan. I have followed all the series up to date.
It came as quite a surprise that I was forced to admit that I found another SciFi show (much) better (being Farscape). It had better story arcs and, quite franckly better actors compared to the latest series (some notable exceptions).
As far as I am concerned, the last 3 installments of Star Trek never reached (up to date) the quality and sometimes audacity of the first two series, it never pushed the line. The last shows just prove that packing all stereotypes that seem to boost audiences do not make a good show.
After 7of9, the producers erroneously concluded that the ‘babe factor’ was the most important fact in the success of the character and spawned T’Pal in, again, a cat-suit. Well, I’m getting OT here :(
It is unfortunate that the TNG crew is suffering the first consequences of the brilliant decisions of Star Trek’s current producers (a release one week before TTT, come on).
I never imagined I would say this, but Star Trek needs a rest (esp. from the current managers), and we will probably not miss anything when no new episodes are spewed out again, since I can still marvel at the ‘old’ TNG and TOS episodes and am surprised in the story lines…
Re: It is unavoidable
I’ve long since stopped mourning for the whole franchise because it is as good as dead. It contracted a terminal illness with Voyager, but had spells of health there. Enterprise represents the death throws of a once great entity. (sic)
Perhaps in 10-15 years they’ll come out with another movie (I’m hoping a DS9 movie, maybe with Sisko only being there in spirit or on leave from the prophets, or perhaps a Dominion War movie detailing the Enterprise-E’s battle experiances).
Nevertheless they need to let the franchise rest and recouperate. It’s been more than 15 years since TNG premiered and there hasn’t been a significant period since then which hasn’t had at least one Trek series in production.