In a TrekCulture interview a week ago, Rob Kazinsky, who plays Zeph in Section 31, talked about his reaction to the S13 movie.
He revealed one interesting point from behind the scenes about why the movie was made:
When I got this job, I was like, “Ugh, Section 31 movie, why are they doing a Section 31 movie? It’s gonna be hated from the get-go. No ones gonna want to watch a Section 31 movie. We’re doing a TV-budget movie. This isn’t going to be what people want…” And I spoke to Alex [Kurtzman] and I spoke to Olatunde [Osunsanmi] and they explained to me that Star Trek is dying. And I don’t know if people know that. You know, I was talking about Star Trek at my gym where I fight. You know, I’m a boxer where I fight with a lot of kids - you know, I don’t fight them but train them - none of them knew what Star Trek was. Could you imagine that?
He went on to say that Star Trek had never had a base as big as Harry Potter or Star Wars but the small fanbase was passionate. He says that fanbase is aging and “we are going to lose Star Trek if we don’t bring in new fans, new eyes and new ways of getting people to love the things that we love.”
I think that’s a valid point but Section 31 is not the answer. It’s not particularly interesting for kids (I think) or for adults, whether or not they’re Trek fans already. And for fans, this type of storytelling sacrifices the optimistic ethos (though not immune from criticism along the lines of DS9) that’s at the heart of the Federation and the franchise. And I’m not even arguing this from a canon or gatekeeping point of view. It’s not utlilizing Star Trek’s niche and unique selling point in the market. Why should kids watch Star Trek instead of Captain America, Suicide Squad, or any MCU movie?
Here comes the question: If you’re in Alex Kurtzman’s position, how are you going to sell the franchise to a new, young audience? How are you going to convince kids who spend their time playing Roblox and watching Mr. Beast that Star Trek is a good show to watch?
I don’t get the optimism vs ambitious feud.
I believe you think that DIS is the most optimistic because of its emphasis on emotional depth.
And I guess we can agree that the part of ambitiousness is a default of startrek for as long as it involves creatures from all kinds of worlds building teams and manage to work together. Basically for as long as the federation aka starfleet is part of the story.
Then why is it not a problem if that ambitiousness is paired with “optimism” ?
Could there be a reboot that decides to go back to the optimistic world view of the original?
It’s not just Trek. Who decided that all SciFi has to be dystopian, brooding, militaristic, or horror?
It’s ironic that if you want Trek with the vibe of the original you have to watch “The Orville”.
I see this take a lot, but it frankly just doesn’t reflect what I see on the screen. Can you give some examples from the shows that influenced you to form that opinion? I agree DS9 could probably be correctly be considered “dystopian , brooding and militaristic”, sure, but Discovery, Picard and SNW are (if anything) cloyingly optimistic and positive!
We already have Prodigy, Strange New Worlds, and Lower Decks under Kurtzman that are considered “optimistic.” The question is, do kids want optimism?
I’d consider Discovery to be optimistic as well - striving to make the world(s) a better place in the face of conflict, uncertainty, and disaster is still optimism. In fact, it’s arguably the type of optimism we need now more than ever before.
The first season of Picard flirted with similar themes, but I don’t think that series ultimately went anywhere with them.
I agree there’s intention to present optimism and humanism in the face of conflict, but I find the execution to be lackluster. An example that comes to mind is Pike objecting to using mines in season 2 of DIS. He raises the issue directly to Cornwell, saying it’s against Federation values. Then for some reason, the discussion becomes finding out why the Enterprise was diverted away from the Klingon war and ends praising Pike being “the best of Starfleet.” The entire discussion about using unethical weaponry during wartime is sidetracked and left unresolved. The mines are still there on the station, and the responsibility of Starfleet Command for not taking down those Klingon mines is not explored.
Another example is the explanation of the Burn. From interviews I’ve seen, the intention behind the crying Kelpien is to highlight the need to understand and sympathize with people vastly different from you even when the universe is as vast with warp travel impossible. The resolution is Burnham and Saru finding this Kelpien and help him understand his visions and thoughts, calm him down, and make warping safe again. But this Kelpien lacks characterization from the beginning. The audience doesn’t know him that well, and we don’t know why we should sympathize with his personal resolution. It would be much stronger if the cause of the Burn is the Emerald Syndicate, which we have established as a hostile force against the Federation. And we know they have good cause to be suspicious of the Federation from Osyraa’s meeting with Vance. In the show, despite this message of reaching out to the vastly different, the Federation and the Chain never understood each other and resorted to using force. Another good candidate for the cause of the Burn is Ni’Var, which has its reasonable suspicions of the Federation at the time.
I find the execution to be lackluster.
This is, to an extent, in the eye of the beholder, and I’m not inclined to argue too much about taste.
Except. Except.
the explanation of the Burn
I honestly think this is the most “Star Trek” thing the franchise has done in…decades. It feels like it was ripped straight out of TOS, and I absolutely adore it.
Agreed - there are different flavours of optimism. TNG presented a promise that one day, humanity will overcome the petty squabbles and bad ideologies it’s mired in today. There’s a place for that, but I think there’s more appetite today for a focus on how we’ll achieve that future - that we can and will fight for it.
Honestly, if I were pitching a concept to attract some fresh attention, I’d go with a “Star Trek: WW3” series. Set it around 2240 to 2250, feature Khan as a big bad, maybe sprinkle in some E.T. interference a la “Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow” to keep that essential sci-fi flavour. You could also mine the Reeves-Stevens novel “Federation” for some inspiration. The point would be to make it feel contemporary and topical, but ultimately show that when that tipping point into Star Trek’s future arrives, we’ll be able to tip in the right direction.
I think there’s definitely room for different tones and ideas, as long as we also have SNW to keep that classic Trek approach alive.
I have a lot of half-baked thoughts about how TNG was more of a product of its time than we realize.
Growing up in the late 80s - early 90s, a lot of us were taught that social injustice were issues of the past, and TNG reflected that perspective.
That…well, even at the time, we were being sold a false bill of goods, and it certainly isn’t the world we live in today.
TNG did try to address social justice issues, but agreed it did so in a way that was extremely of its time. The Outcast is a great go-to example of that. It’s basically an anti-conversion therapy parable, so definitely progressive for its time, but in the process it portrays non-binary gender expression as literally alien to the Enterprise crew.
I have a half-baked thought of my own.
That as the world slides into the maws of oligarchy, we need to see the Star Trek series that zooms in on the transition away from money.
They should face the music of class war with that Trek panache that made them great👌
Stop trying to be ‘cool’ (or whatever you think is cool). Star Trek was never cool. Just do Star Trek and the right people will find it.
Un-cancel Lower Decks. 😉
Honestly, though, I feel like most media groups in general forget why the streaming model worked in the first place. They want Office-level hits, but forget that The Office wasn’t immediately successful. Not immediately killing it just because of that gave it time to find a fandom.
Most shows should automatically get 2-3 seasons, and they often aren’t getting that.
As for the whole “none of them knew what Star Trek was” anecdote - I find that a bit exaggerated. I’m a college student, and I wore a Boimler costume for Halloween- most could identify that I was something Star Trek. Around other people my age, they can at least think of Spock or Patrick Stewart.
How I got into Trek as a kid was my mom would be watching it, and she’d let us join even though we were supposed to be doing homework. TNG was the one I saw the most during that.
P.S: As I’ve floated around this forum several times, I think an animated anthology series of strange new crews would be awesome.
I wore a Boimler costume for Halloween
Nice
It’s more TV is dying and Kurtzman hates Star Trek as a concept and can only write one kind of story. There is this thing we need to find that thing. An entire season about finding that thing.
When star trek is done right it works and gets shared around and does well. The five OG star trek series. Strange new worlds, The Orville Prodigy
It also kills me that Kurtzman misses the entire point of what Section 31 was in DS9. When he said a utopia can’t exist without someone doing the dirty work like S31. That kinda of undermineds the entire point of star trek and If we have gotten to that point star trek is already dead and a dystopian zombie is wearing it’s face.
There is this thing we need to find that thing. An entire season about finding that thing.
Ah yes, the season-sized adventure that feels like a bunch of yak-shaving fetch-quests in an rpg.
we must find the progenitor macguffin, but first we must find the treasure map, but first…
If we look for it we probably see this pattern is common across many trek episodes, but across a season they managed to do it in such a way that feels very obvious and hard to miss.
Yeah an episode is fine if you can put a twist on it but a “full campaign” I mean “Season” of story telling. I would expect more from my group’s DM and he doesn’t get paid.
Free to air. It’s how we all got hooked
There are plenty of good responses here already, but to me the main thing in marketing Trek to new audiences would be stop the frigging nostalgia fest.
- don’t circle back to the TOS characters at the tip of a hat. Yes, JJ Abrams, I’m looking at you, but also every other recent attempt at new Star trek movies.
- All the stories around those characters have been told already. Make something new and current within the same universe.
- Don’t shoehorn canon and continuity onto every new show. Having Bones make a cameo in the TNG pilot was cute. Making Burnham a previously unmentioned lynchpin in Spock’s character was… unnecessary. Don’t get me started on SNW.
- The wealth of continuity from previous shows shouldn’t be a namecheck scorecard, but a backdrop that curious current viewers can track down and explore on their own.
Twenty years ago when the BBC relaunched Doctor Who, they played down all the background stuff for most of the first season, only drip feeding lore to the audience.
- The stories, the characters had to be appealing on their own
- The 26 seasons worth of classic Who wasn’t required watching to keep up, but it gave resonance to the new show.
Star trek needs to learn from that approach to focus on good stories and engaging characters — and to aim outside of the established but dwindling fan group by allowing the almost 60 years of canon to play second violin.
Make it episodic again, focus on the story instead of the action, and basically just do TNG, but with even better sets, costumes and make-up. Stop trying to be dark, gritty and edgy. If there is an over-arcing narrative, make it the B or C plot in most episodes, to keep it episodic by nature.
You’re basically describing Strange New Worlds 😂
I seriously keep forgetting about that one and need to watch it.
Please do. I was surprised to find it really back2theroots. I hope they finish it. And not just 3 seasons please.
Give them Andor instead of Ahsoka; they need to make more content that speaks to the universal human condition and less about the cool worlds and characters they’ve got. The people want Squid Game and Severance, not another cinematic universe.
A lot of writers seem to have forgotten that scifi uses aliens and new worlds to talk about humans. They just think that scifi uses aliens and new worlds.
