Create a new series premise

[Nate the Great]

Okay, here's a question. Would a new Trek animated series work? After all, that would allow the actors to portray their characters without worrying about the effects of aging. I mean a new prime-time show, of course, not kiddy stuff like Stargate: Infinity. Plus we could have more nonhumanoid aliens.

[PointyHairedJedi]

Actually, that's a very interesting thought. Yes, it could work, but it would undoubtedly be pushed at kids, so whether it would be a success is an entirely different matter.

[Nate the Great]

Why would it have to be pushed at kids? Not that that's a bad thing, necessarily, given that any reasonably loyal Trekkie these days has to be at least in their late teens, and can we raise another generation of them on old dusty DVDs only, but there are such things as cartoons that the entire family can enjoy.

In fact, I'm slightly repulsed by the notion that adults must be embarassed by watching cartoons. I still enjoy watching anime, and I have Gargoyles on in the background right now. Look at the success of Shrek and Toy Story.

[PointyHairedJedi]

Originally Posted by Nate the Great

Why would it have to be pushed at kids?

Because it's a cartoon, and in America everyone knows that cartoons are for kids. Duh.

Balderdash, of course, and there are a very few home grown exceptions (Futurama being the only one I can conjure up right now, in additon to Gargoyles). The other two examples that you gave were both big-budget 3D animations, which is an altogether different beast - it's pretty new-ish, and completely lacking in the decades-long association between tradional animation and kids shows/films - and even then it's always slanted at 'family' entertainment. I need not have bothered typing that out, though, as by going on to list anime you're really very much made the point I'm belabouring right now, which is that it comes down to culture. What cartoons are in Japan is waay different than what they are in the West, at least in the minds of the people who are empowered to put the money up for them, and those are really the only people that matter. So that's why any latter-day Trek cartoon would invariably be aimed at kids and young teens. It sucks, but it's true.

[Nate the Great]

Yes, but I'd like to imagine that modern-day Trekkies would watch anyway, and see that "heh, this is actually good stuff!" Witness the resurgence of TAS.

[PointyHairedJedi]

...There's been a resurgence? And maybe they would, if it were good enough (and I'm talking Spongebob Squarepants good), but it's still a niche of a niche at the end of the day; something that may very well be watched and liked by existing fans, but will be hard pressed to gain the kind of new audience that Paramount is after. I could be being overly pessimistic about the whole thing, of course, but I think if Paramount follows a business-as-usual mindset then a live-action series is very much more likely than an animated one.

[ijdgaf]

Adults watch cartoons. They watch Family Guy, The Simpsons, South Park... maybe King of the Hill and Futurama can/could be thrown in there as well.

A new animated Trek series would not be able to capture those viewers, at least not many of them. I'm thinking the best they could hope for was a Batman TAS vibe -- something marketed/aimed toward the kids, but with an adult enough vibe that certain longtime fans would pick up on it too.

But I think PHJ is right. Unless they were deliberately TRYING to capture the kid market (and really, Batman is way cooler than Star Trek and I imagine even a good, similarly toned Trek series would have/achieve stigmas and wouldn't capture the kids' interest nearly as well), I don't see it being a good move by Paramount.

Really, I think talking about any new series (at least, realistically) is a bit silly as that's just not where they're going now and won't be for a long while. I'm content to sit back and enjoy the films. Or not, as the case may be.

[Chancellor Valium]

TAS is really no worse than the rest of TOS in terms of story.

[ijdgaf]

I agree, except my adjectives would be more positive.

Doesn't stop a new TAS from not being the smartest move the studios could make.

Chew on those double negatives.

[Nate the Great]

Of course there's been a resurgence of TAS! Hey, I've only known that there was a TAS in the first place for less than ten years. That's the odd part, I own most of the novelizations from the seventies, but I never knew they were novelizations of a cartoon, I just thought that they were short stories, Trek fiction from the pre-Pocket Books days. We have DVDs now, the staff at Enterprise stuck little bits of TAS canon in the background, etc. etc.

I'm still worried about the idea of "if we did make Kiddie Trek, would those kids actually buy the live-action Trek DVDs when they grow up and become all-purpose Trekkies, or would they shun it?" The latter option seems more likely.