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Rick Berman Doesn't Know Why Nemesis Tanked
Steve Krutzler writes "Star Trek producer Rick Berman broke his silence today on the debacle that was the North American box office for STAR TREK NEMESIS. The film grossed $18.5 million in its opening weekend in mid-December, the lowest of any TREK bow, and its current domestic total stands below even that of the much-lambasted STAR TREK V. Read more at TrekWeb. Berman says he doesn't know why the movie failed and the future of more TREK movies is uncertain."
Maybe it tanked because Star Trek is dying out in mainstream culture. We still have Enterprise, which is interesting, and Voyager reruns, but I can't imagine that they get good ratings. Sure the cultists still worship Star Trek, but I imagine most people have become less entralled with it.
in a better way, in previous Star Trek adventures.
It was retelling of Wrath of Khan without the great characters.
Just as "Generations" sucked, where they tried to put every element into one movie (destroy the ship, cold character gets emotions, major character dies, etc.), so did Nemesis.
I have to agree. The Star Trek franchise needs a 15-20 year hiatus. It's just our of ideas. Enterprise is like watching paint dry. I saw Nemesis in the theater and it was just an average 2 hour episode. I'm a huge fan of Star Trek in general, and TNG in particular - but the Star Trek universe needs a break.
Unfortunately, Firefly got cancelled. It was 10x better than Nemesis or Enterprise. And there are no mid-season sci-fi replacements.
I was a trekkie when younger - also a star wars fan. I am much less the 2 now, even though sci fi and sci fantasy still capture my interest.
Why? Well, it isn't the characters, but most definately is the plot. Star Trek lacks history. It had it with TOS and TNG. Technology had advanced, and we could see that. Story lines were still based on the premise that people and aliens have feelings and personal demons to battle.
With the advent of DS9 and Voyager, Star Trek left the historical line and issues between peoples and personal demons for outrageous story lines that included the borg chasing but never defeating a small ship in the middle of no where- neglecting the history of the borg as almost undefeatable. And a space station of mixed people. So much potential in that series, but it lost because they could not create enough internal issue stories.
Star Wars had a huge following not only because of its ground breaking fx, but also because it had history. 1000 years of jedi rule. Empire that was how old? Jedi master was how old? Clone wars? Obi Wan knew Vader before The Fall? History was loud in the ears of Star Wars fans. I cared less for the post ROTJ books. I wanted more history. It was finally granted- and I was sickened.
I think another area is culture. Star Trek was a 'perfect culture' that worked well in TNG, and was still rough and being learned in TOS. But there was culture. It was neglected in the newer series. Again, DS9 had the opportunity, but the ball was dropped in favor of a huge war that left me thinking 'eh'.
I loved the culture of star wars- so many peoples, and yet corruption, love, hate, revenge, politics, all together loosely in a republic and empire. It works for me.
I think that the rules were perverted so severely in Star Trek that it wasn't funny. Suddenly in one episode the tachyon field can be adjusted to deflet energy fields, while in the next they can't stop weapons from smashing the shields to '12%' and 'surrender'. Star Wars allowed for everyone to be able to die- and the heroes are either gifted or lucky- not suddenly supremely good at manipulating technologies and even nature.
Time travel and cloaking devices should go. Why does it work here, but not there. Suddenly we can track a cloaked ship, but next time we are completly caught off guard. I understand the element of surprise, but people, come on.
Rick, Star Trek is dying because you neglected what made it great. Sure, some story lines were campy, but until the end of TNG, it worked. Culture, history were enough to keep the story fresh. But you trashed those along with technology and left it utterly unwatchable.
They stuck me in an institution, said it was the only solution, to...protect me from the enemy, myself
The TNG Universe (and Enterprise) is formulaic, over-produced, slick to the point of featurelessness, and so politically correct it is painful to watch.
In other words, it sucks. I have not seen it; nothing in the previews gave me any sense as to why I'd want to see it.
I've been watching Trek since the original series. The original was fun, quirky, politically-incorrect for its time, and just plain fun. The dynamic of Kirk-McCoy-Spock was fun and stimulating.
TNG started off good, and sank into mediocrity, boring characters, and political correctness. The Federation had gone from being an adventure to being a boring bureaucracy filled with faceless people who remind me of white bread. DS9 had some good moments, most of which were lost in Voyager and the movies. Where is the passion, the joy of exploration, the diversity of cultures? Bah, Berman's Trek is mostly about destroying any sense of individuality or culture or faith or initiative.
Enterprise is an example of everything that is wrong with Trek. These are not bold adventurers; they are simpering fools who wouldn't last fiv minutes in the universe of Kirk and Spock. The only character I have any fondness for is the Chief Engineer, who exudes some personality (when he's allowed to).
I do not want to live in the Star Trek envisioned by Berman and Braga; in my opinion, they destroyed the series with blandness.
All about me
A quote from his Nemesis review:
" think it is time for "Star Trek" to make a mighty leap forward another 1,000 years into the future, to a time when starships do not look like rides in a 1970s amusement arcade, when aliens do not look like humans with funny foreheads, and when wonder, astonishment and literacy are permitted back into the series. Star Trek was kind of terrific once, but now it is a copy of a copy of a copy."
I think the movie failed because it wasn't satisfying, nor it it seem to make much sense.
And no, I'm not talking the dumber-then-hell physics nonsense that usually permeates ST. I'm talking about the plot.
Cuts. Check IMDB for the movie's quotes. How many of those were actually in the movie? The cut out a lot of background stuff that explained why this stuff was happening, and what the character's motivations were.
For instance: That Romulan commander (woman). At first she appears she's going to be a toady for Shinzan. She was asking that Romulan admiral some pointed questions after the big ship goes to zap Earth, like she was trying to see if the admiral was going to betray Shinzan. Then, all of a sudden, she's betraying Shinzan? What? Why did she change her mind? Did we learn enough about her character to understand why she might change her mind?
Over and over the point of the movie is that people are good when they aspire to be better than themselves. That's what is supposed to make Data better than B4. It's a fine sentiment, but where is it actually shown in the movie? Saying it is fine for a book or something. But you've got to have it be a central part of the movie, or it is just a plattitude.
And how did Deanna learn to fight back against Shinzan and the Chancellor? Why didn't she do that the first time?
Oh yeah, and as for physics... Ships with impulse drive can go like 0.99c. If you decide to ram another ship, you're going to end up with a big cloud of plasma and debris, not some lame "crunch".
And the cloaking... why couldn't the Enterprise's brilliant engineers program the weapons to shoot right back at anything shooting at the ship? It doesn't matter if the Romulan ship is cloaked, it's shooting you right now! Right over there! Sheesh.
Dear Rick
The screenplay was horrible! The writing for Voyager and TNG was wonderful. I remember plots within plots and sideplots and twists and turns.
Nemesis was so one-dimensional, it hurt my head. I kept waiting for the "retarded" Data to turn out to be Lore or for some new technology to be introduced or for Troi to get pregnant... or a million things that might have been interesting with that much raw acting talent on hand.
You gave a cast of superb actors the worst screenplay I think I have ever seen. It looked as though every interesting idea got tabled by committee or something. We ended up with a really flat uninteresting story. Whatever happend with Wesley going off with the traveler?
Where are the other members of the crystalline entity's species? How about Species 8472? How about Janeway and Picard gettig together? What about the Voyager crew on Earth.. what about the reunion therE? For crying out loud, this could have been SO cool! It just plain sucked because it didn't live up to its potential. DAMN it could have been awesome! Instead it was just disappointing.
The machine that has been Star Trek still has the capability of producing heart-pounding, thought-provoking and deeply interesting entertainment worthy of the cast and worthy of Roddenberry. Hop to it! We expect more.
- a Star Trek fan
Vortran out
Knowledge is like ignorance.. too much can be just as bad as not enough.
Seriously, Wil, got any comments?
Well, I was going to burn my mod points in this thread, but I'll give it a shot:
I think that the release date was incredibly stupid. It's almost like Paramount wanted to "bury" this movie. I have no idea why they released it when they did.
But the release date shouldn't matter. If the story is strong enough, people will go to see it over and over again. As far as I can tell, this is where Paramount fumbled this movie.
When Star Trek is good, it's about people. That's why my favorite episode is Inner Light. That's why I loved working on First Duty and Final Mission.
The script that I read for Nemesis was about people. John Logan is a HUGE fan, who knows every detail about TNG. He infused the characters and plot with detalis that would make a Trekkie drool. He understood why people cared about these characters, and told an incredible story. I still haven't seen the final cut, but everything I've read indicates that they got away from that. I have heard that on more than one occasion the director proclaimed that he didn't care about Star Trek history and continuity. It seemed like he really didn't respect the fans or the franchise, so they ended up with yet another action movie with robots and laser guns.
Sadly, I think that an action movie in space is exactly what Paramount wants.
Marketing a Star Trek movie is insanely difficult. Mainstream audiences think it's just for nerds. They think that they need to watch seven seasons of TNG to know what's going on. Paramount knows that the hardcore fans will show up no matter what, so they focus their attention on convincing the mainstream audience that they'll like this movie.
The trap they seem to fall into when they do this is to cut up the movie, take out stuff that's too "fan-specific," and focus on themes that appeal to a broader audience: babes and bombs. This usually alienates the hardcore fans, and doesn't excite mainstream audiences enough to see it more than once -- and that's where a movie makes money: on repeat sales.
The few times they've managed to hit both audiences -- Star Trek IV and Star Trek II -- they've focused people.
I'm hearing that this is the end of TNG, and it probably is. From what I've heard, some of the actors aren't interested in doing it any more, which is understandable, considering that they've been playing those characters for over 15 years.
But I don't think it's the end of Star Trek movies. TPTB aren't stupid. If they were, they wouldn't be running this franchise. I think they've just gotten away from the heart of Star Trek. If they find that heart again, and hire some very good SF writers to defibrillate it, Star Trek will be fine. There's still some life in the old girl.