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Star Trek recipe for soaps?


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I like lots of different things, but nothing about his shows have ever really impressed me. I think he tries too hard - tries too hard to be cutting-edge, innovative, and contemporary and it all comes off as false, directionless, and mundane to me.

So while he may succeed in being commercially successful, he does not succeed in being clever, at least to me.

I love Herskovitz and Zwick, but don't get me started on their shiteous Quarterlife experiment. :rolleyes:

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I didn't want to go too off-topic, as I felt I had, but it feels good to bash those awful snap your fingers to open the TARDIS/best way for an adventurer to live happily ever after is to read fairy tales to kids in a computer episodes, so thanks for the catharsis.

I agree Russell was overrated sometimes, early on, but I don't think the tone of his work on Who was ever, "This show sucks and is lucky to have a genius like RTD." If it ever was, he's more than criticized now. I have seen that undertone with Abrams and Trek, and I think it's a way to undercut any potential future the Trek franchise could have. I'm reminded of the man who made Bewitched into a movie and said he was going to improve on the show (ha ha ha), or the man who updated Bionic Woman and said he never bothered to watch the original show. Why even bother to remake a show if part of your press campaign involves the original show being treated with contempt.

Back to soaps...I just want to see a producer or a writer who loves the genre, and who will not get press for simply trashing what came before them. Even Gloria Monty, who was known for disliking the slow pace of soaps and who changed the genre radically, at least had experience with the old format, through her work at Secret Storm, and tried to keep some of the old tenets while embracing new forms of production and storytelling.

That's why I brought up Guza and Sheffer. When Guza returned to GH, the soap press went on about how thrilled they were to have Bob back, GH was unbearable without him, Guza was going to save GH. Instead he destroyed it. Sheffer got the same press at ATWT, even though he hit the skids after less than a year, and the same at DAYS, even though that golden age didn't even last for more than a few months. They both get or got press based on their name, on their own hype, not on what they do for soaps. JFP is another one. It took over a decade of one soap catastrophe after another for the press to finally stop touting her as a miracle worker.

What I'm saying is I hope soaps can be saved, if that's possible, by someone who is known for their talent, not for themselves or their PR machine.

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Well to briefly discuss Abrams in general. I understand why some think he's overrated but he does some things very well. Namely he gives me exactly the type of storytelling I mentioned in the "What do you want?" thread, especially strong women and that is something soaps have been completely clueless on. Today's soap writers should be hogtied and forced to watch a week of Abrams (and Whedon) just to learn how to write women.</Abrams discussion>

I've said before that I think the audiences for soaps and sci-fi are remarkable similar. They're both finite, obsessively loyal, history focused and very resistant to outsiders (or as we like to call them newbies) whether its writers, actors, or shows/movies/concepts/stories. So why is sci-fi so healthy and soap so...not? I go back to one of my usual harangues: sci fi shows were allowed to run their course, die and be reborn even if they were reborn in derivative ways. Star Trek has essentially been the same stories told over and over with different casts and better special effects. It's ironic that 2009 GL's production model had the quality of 1966 Star Trek

Could soaps do what Star Trek and sci-fi in general did? Look at BSG. Original BSG was so lame even Trekkers looked down on it. New BSG kicked ass. But new BSG was on the SciFi Channel. The Sci Fi Channel has really shown support for that genre. The same can't be said for SoapNet.

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I would love to see SyFy reboot some soaps like Dark Shadows oe The Edge of Night.

My dream would be a HBO/Showtime reboot of something like Santa Barabara.

And following these rules? It could so happen.

However i do tend to think the genre needs to die for this to happen, or any soaps left need to make the switch to off-network and a complete reboot. But it needs to be a soap that can handle it, and not even being a fanboy here, Days would be my choice soap.

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Great article.

Soaps might be the victims of their own success. One could argue that Grey's Anatomy, for example, is a "reboot" of General Hospital. So many primetime shows have incorporated serialized storytelling that it's tougher than ever for soaps to attract a fanbase.

The ironic thing about Guza's GH is that it's a rip-off of Sopranos, and that show is a hybrid of Goodfellas and a classic P&G style soap. The Sopranos was a soap, with the burning question if/when/how will Tony be whacked haunting the series until its final frame. Considering the success of Grey's, one would think that GH would give up the mob stories and return full force to their hospital roots. GH will never be able to compete with the violence and sexuality of the Sopranos, but they can certainly tell the same sentimental hospital cases we see on Grey's.

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Well I'm a die-hard Trekkie - and the new movie BLEW - it was NOT Star Trek.

Sure, it shook up the franchise and it will bring lots of new viewers and millions of dollars - but if soaps take this approach, then they will alienate their loyal fanbase.

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Pretty much all the things in the article have already been tried with soaps, and have alienated some soap fans. Skew younger (since the 70s, and tried on a whole show with Passions), break away from the past (rewriting history, making new core families), pick up the pace (Jean P.'s episodic speeding through stories at ATWT, PC's 13-week stories), update the look (High-def, GL's new production model), etc. The only thing that hasn't been tried is starting at the beginning with a prequel, although you could say when shows bring on "the ex we never knew" or invent new backstory like Olivia being raped by Jeffrey, that is what that is.

If anything, I think a "big name" theory might be the most applicable. If you could get a respected writer and producer to work on a daytime soap, that would bring publicity and sycophantic respect.

Also, I think taking a break for a few years and then coming back might be part of the secret too. This means that Another World's revival may have legs beyond just text episodes.

The way some longtime Star Trek fans who don't like the new movie are being mocked stereotypically is horrible, by the way.

I agree with CarlD2 about Russell T Davies and agree that his approach is superior because it respects the past while moving the show forward, a continuation, instead of rebooting like showing the young Doctor on Gaillfrey on something. He has had a distinguished career before Doctor Who too, including the original Queer as Folk. And Moffat's work as executive producer hasn't even aired yet so I don't see how he can be judged to be superior. Moffat's work as a writer for Doctor Who was under Russell T Davies/Julie Gardner as executive producer and Davies as head writer, so that is Davies's work too.

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:mellow: Have you read the 5 points? No one's talking about the movie really, it's about the 5 points.

That's one interpretation. And a wrong one, too. Sure, one can always distort anything to suit one's needs.

And QAF sucks. Deal with it. Together with Davies. And his Doctor Who.

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I thought the point was about what makes a successful revival, not quality. Even if you don't like Davies or his revival of Doctor Who, then you realize the show has been brought back from the dead. If soaps ever do revive, I'm sure I won't like some of the new versions of soaps, but I would still appreciate seeing the genre given new life.

Much of the undertone for this new movie is for old fans to get out of the way, because Trek sucked before the unparalleled genius of JJ Abrams held his nose and waded into the stinky Federation waters. I just hope all these people who are only interested because of Abrams will stay around if he isn't involved with more of the movies, because otherwise, decades of history will have been tossed out for a one-hit wonder who is already on the way to his next vanity project.

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And it so did. One of the worst TV shows on Earth ever. Lousy scripts, pathetically didactic at every turn, too corny and shallow, D-list actors, grotesque sets and so on... How did it achieve such popularity is beyond any explanation.

And, Carl, you obviously haven't met J. J. Abrams. And even if you did, argumentum ad hominem is a no-no. He is actually a very down-to-earth, geeky guy who likes what his doing. It just so happens that's it's also commercially successful; no one is stopping you to do the same.

Furthermore, just because you sense an undertone, it doesn't mean it's actually there.

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You even quoted comments to that effect.

I'm sure JJ Abrams is a wonderful man, but like Joss Whedon, who also tends to abandon his shows, he gets far more press for himself and how awesome he's supposed to be than for what he actually works on.

Alias was never very successful, even when given the post-Super Bowl timeslot. Lost crashed in the ratings after the first season or two. Fringe is an average performer, in spite of a heavy marketing campaign and being aired after American Idol. I don't know how his Mission Impossible movie did, the first one (before he was involved) was so bad I never paid attention to the others.

If Abrams finally has a big hit in Star Trek, then he should be proud, but I think the film will also be a success because of those fans and the 40 year legacy that is now supposed to be so worthless compared to his involvement.

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Simply, without going into any details:

1. Begin at the beginning = start gradually introducing new characters and families that do not suck and shifting the focus from the current, worn out ones.

2. Skew younger = no to teen overload; many watched The O.C. not because of Seth & Summer, Ryan & annoying-as-hell Marissa, but because of Kirsten and Sandy. Teens don't want to watch other annoying teens, they crave for mature, successful, larger-than-life adults. Don't forget: in order for them to survive, they have to attract younger people who will get old one day and still watch.

3. Pick up the pace = one day does not equal 5 episodes. Also, vary the pace — some stories are faster, some are slower, they all go concurrently, as one fades, the other begins. Nancy Curlee put it perfectly: It was just glorious to get the whole boat moving in a direction you liked, to weave all of the characters and stories, to have things appear, recede, come back. No to crash & burn approach, no to 100 scenes in an episode (à la Guza's GH), no to ABC-esque stories which last for a month and have no real consequences.

4. Update the look = destroy & burn then send to Jupiter the godawful sets & costumes present on every show. Fire all the set & costume people and send them to Mars. No to tape, yes to film. Decrease the use of heavy wood, weird lighting, more locations shoots and real(istic) mansions for the rich. Vary the blocking techniques.

5. Break away from the past = for example, sometimes you just have to let go of some characters. They can't live forever. Better not to see them at all (the annoying-as-hell Luke & Laura) than to destroy them beyond belief. JackPeyton and I agree that I don't really care who you write about, I care about the greatness of the tale you're telling. Many will disagree, I know, but I am firmly against vet dictatorship & vets thrown down our throat ad nauseam. Vets and hands-off, no-one-can-touch-them characters ultimately hurt any soap.

In short, that's it.

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