Alex Kurtzman signs 4 year contract extension worth $160 Million

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Re: Alex Kurtzman signs 4 year contract extension worth $160 Million

Post by McAvoy »

You cannot use the Original Series as an example when you talk about continuity issues. They were making it all up as they went along. And they are the first of Trek.

Yes fans do get to the point where a small continiuity gaffe is blown up bigger than it should.

But if through multiple series since TOS for example shows Vulcans as emotionless but constantly say they do in fact have emotions but suppress them then it should always follow that. Anything that states otherwise is a continiuity error. It is the rules of the in universe.

Yes Trek has a ton of continiuity errors through out its history. There is a reason why a site like Ex Scientia exists.
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Re: Alex Kurtzman signs 4 year contract extension worth $160 Million

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In point of fact, the deal is the headline amount for the whole deal through 2026. It sounds very much like the number also rolls in Kurtzman's non-Trek projects, too, and every busy-beaver empire builder always keeps a stable full of those.

Kurtzman is certainly not the person DS9-era fans would pick to be the showrunner. But what's new? We held our nose about Gene and his cronies, we hated B&B, we were annoyed with JJ and his Star Wars aspirations. Now the latest of them is sitting directly in a lens flare in what *has* to be a self-aware moment:

https://trekmovie.com/wp-content/upload ... 0x373.jpeg

5.5 years is a long time and could serve to add optimism and stability to the overall business and production side of Trek, but than again, the articles seem to indicate that the shotgun spray of new shows are still subject to perennial network-henpecking, including budget cuts for Picard.

At the very least, the deal is the clearest indication yet that for Paramount, Star Trek is an essential service. My, how far we've come since 2005...
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Re: Alex Kurtzman signs 4 year contract extension worth $160 Million

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PerrySimm wrote: Sat Aug 07, 2021 5:35 am In point of fact, the deal is the headline amount for the whole deal through 2026. It sounds very much like the number also rolls in Kurtzman's non-Trek projects, too, and every busy-beaver empire builder always keeps a stable full of those.

Kurtzman is certainly not the person DS9-era fans would pick to be the showrunner. But what's new? We held our nose about Gene and his cronies, we hated B&B, we were annoyed with JJ and his Star Wars aspirations. Now the latest of them is sitting directly in a lens flare in what *has* to be a self-aware moment:

https://trekmovie.com/wp-content/upload ... 0x373.jpeg

5.5 years is a long time and could serve to add optimism and stability to the overall business and production side of Trek, but than again, the articles seem to indicate that the shotgun spray of new shows are still subject to perennial network-henpecking, including budget cuts for Picard.

At the very least, the deal is the clearest indication yet that for Paramount, Star Trek is an essential service. My, how far we've come since 2005...
The irony is that ENT by modern standards was still making huge ratings.
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Re: Alex Kurtzman signs 4 year contract extension worth $160 Million

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PerrySimm wrote: Sat Aug 07, 2021 5:35 am In point of fact, the deal is the headline amount for the whole deal through 2026. It sounds very much like the number also rolls in Kurtzman's non-Trek projects, too, and every busy-beaver empire builder always keeps a stable full of those.

Kurtzman is certainly not the person DS9-era fans would pick to be the showrunner. But what's new? We held our nose about Gene and his cronies, we hated B&B, we were annoyed with JJ and his Star Wars aspirations. Now the latest of them is sitting directly in a lens flare in what *has* to be a self-aware moment:

https://trekmovie.com/wp-content/upload ... 0x373.jpeg

5.5 years is a long time and could serve to add optimism and stability to the overall business and production side of Trek, but than again, the articles seem to indicate that the shotgun spray of new shows are still subject to perennial network-henpecking, including budget cuts for Picard.

At the very least, the deal is the clearest indication yet that for Paramount, Star Trek is an essential service. My, how far we've come since 2005...
Or it's just a sunk cost and Paramount does what every other corporate does when they're having trouble with their finances: double down and pretend everything goes well.
Not long ago (aka 2 months ago), Paramount/Viacom was revealed dodging taxes by using a complicated system of shell companies outside US, to avoid paying nearly 4 billion $ in taxes, on revenue from franchises like Spongebob Squarepants, Mission: Impossible and surprise surprise Star Trek:
https://gizmodo.com/viacomcbs-avoided-n ... 1847011793
I have no doubt most if not all the other Hollywood companies do something similar, only Paramount was dumb enough to get "caught". But it does show that for all their glitter and PR, these companies are full of shit and don't care much about their properties as they like to pretend. Ultimately when all you care about is making money in the cheapest and dodgiest way possible, the end product will be of a similar quality.
So I don't see how I should totally trust what Paramount does just because they said so.
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Re: Alex Kurtzman signs 4 year contract extension worth $160 Million

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clearspira wrote: Sat Aug 07, 2021 6:19 am
PerrySimm wrote: Sat Aug 07, 2021 5:35 am In point of fact, the deal is the headline amount for the whole deal through 2026. It sounds very much like the number also rolls in Kurtzman's non-Trek projects, too, and every busy-beaver empire builder always keeps a stable full of those.

Kurtzman is certainly not the person DS9-era fans would pick to be the showrunner. But what's new? We held our nose about Gene and his cronies, we hated B&B, we were annoyed with JJ and his Star Wars aspirations. Now the latest of them is sitting directly in a lens flare in what *has* to be a self-aware moment:

https://trekmovie.com/wp-content/upload ... 0x373.jpeg

5.5 years is a long time and could serve to add optimism and stability to the overall business and production side of Trek, but than again, the articles seem to indicate that the shotgun spray of new shows are still subject to perennial network-henpecking, including budget cuts for Picard.

At the very least, the deal is the clearest indication yet that for Paramount, Star Trek is an essential service. My, how far we've come since 2005...
The irony is that ENT by modern standards was still making huge ratings.
To be fair, it was probably easier to make high ratings back when the highest rated show was doing better.

Way back in 2001-02, the highest rated TV show (Friends) had an average rating of 15. Enterprise did between 5.65-12.54 during the first half of season 1, and 4.5-6.5 during the second half. Keeping in mind that the first half has a novelty bias, this puts Enterprise's performance around 30%-45% Friends's Performance.

By 2004-05, the highest rated TV show (CSI) had an average rating of 16.5. Enterprise did between 2.76-3.39 during the first half of season 4, and 2.53-3.8 during the second half. Even ignoring the fact that the season finale pinched the ratings, this places Enterprise's performance around 15%-23% CSI's performance.

Now comparing these figures to the future is difficult. Looking at the most recent statistics I can find easily, which is to say 2018-19, the highest rated TV show (The Big Bang Theory) had an average rating of 10.6. This has a S1 back half performance of 42%-61% and a S4 performance of 24%-36%. On the other hand, if you compare these figures to ratings of shows on the CW (the successor network to UPN), Enterprise matches or overperforms against them. This is why I say comparing these figures to the future is difficult; the highest rated TV show had lost 1/3 of its viewers by comparison. I don't think it's fair to say "Enterprise would have the exact same number of viewers if the show were running in the late 2010s".
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Re: Alex Kurtzman signs 4 year contract extension worth $160 Million

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Well, just look at The Orville, which was putting in respectable ratings on Fox and yet the Disney-financed production is still moving to Disney-owned Hulu.

So on the one hand *yes* it is still possible for sci-fi to do OK on network TV, even with Enterprise-level viewership. On the other, the business has changed: the Studio System is back and HQ wants to monopolize every show's returns with in-house streaming sites.
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Re: Alex Kurtzman signs 4 year contract extension worth $160 Million

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PerrySimm wrote: Sun Aug 08, 2021 12:17 am Well, just look at The Orville, which was putting in respectable ratings on Fox and yet the Disney-financed production is still moving to Disney-owned Hulu.

So on the one hand *yes* it is still possible for sci-fi to do OK on network TV, even with Enterprise-level viewership.
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According to the article you linked, The Orville got a ~5.7 rating (the numbers I had must have been Live, not Live+7 DVR), which clobbers Enterprise over most of its run.
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Re: Alex Kurtzman signs 4 year contract extension worth $160 Million

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All this talk about ratings really does make me wonder how Supernatural stayed on for 15 seasons.
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Re: Alex Kurtzman signs 4 year contract extension worth $160 Million

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If I had to guess it probably has to do with the CW being relatively weak to begin with, and watching their ratings shrink and stabilize just slow enough to not be as big a concern as Enterprise became.
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Re: Alex Kurtzman signs 4 year contract extension worth $160 Million

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TGLS wrote: Sun Aug 08, 2021 5:31 am If I had to guess it probably has to do with the CW being relatively weak to begin with, and watching their ratings shrink and stabilize just slow enough to not be as big a concern as Enterprise became.
Supernatural's ratiings really has been perry consistent over the last ten seasons.

Obviously Enterprise would be a more expensive show than Supernatural. I suppose they do make enough money off of the show and consistent enough to have kept it going.

Supernatural was always a wonder to me in how long it lasted.
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