ST: Enterprise Cancelled

[Rocket]

TNG/DS9/VOY all had 7 seasons.

ENT, apparently, will have 4.

TOS I can never remember. I think it was around 4, though.

<{POST_SNAPBACK}>

Voyager has 6 seasons not 7.

[Nathan Baker]

Sorry Rocket,

But according to StarTrek.com and several other sources (including my own recollection of watching the entire last season), Voyager ended it's run after 7 seasons.

[Kwame Alexander]

Speaking of which, didn't the last episode have some really nice scenes between shran and the woman from the Aenar? Why couldn't they couldn't start this a few seasons ago.

[Rocket]

O yeah your right, sorry about that.

[Tpreen]

Kwame, I agree with you, and so do many people. Even cast members were complaining that the writing on some previous seasons was atrocious, and most were pleased with the improvement on Season 4. Apparantly the improvement was due to Manny Coto getting more freedom and input on the stories.

[Robert Falcon]

I've got to agree. The first two seasons were ok. They had their moments, and I liked the continuity they held. Third season was well done. Kinda like the Dominion War with DS9, but they didn't drag it on too long. This season has been really well done, and I firmly believe it's because Manny got into the upper ranks.

My dad contributed to the Save Enterprise funds. I really hope they can keep this going. I mean, TNG, the best Trek series to date, still needed a couple seasons to get onto its feet. Enterprise has finally caught its footing, and it should be allowed to keep going.

[Kwame Alexander]

Dammit, another really good episode of Enterprise. I really think Enterprise has really hit it's stride. At least its ending on the upswing

[Idril Mar]

There's a major twist in the Save Enterprise campaign.

posted from: http://www.saveenterprise.com/3m_contribution.htm

TrekUnited.com today announced that three anonymous contributors have stepped forward with a $3 million pledge toward the campaign to ensure a fifth season for the recently cancelled Star Trek: Enterprise.

Paramount Network Television and the United Paramount Network (UPN) jointly announced on Feb. 3 that this would be the last season of Enterprise on UPN. Fans pooled their skills, time and finances to form TrekUnited.com in an effort to fight the decision by raising money themselves to pay for a fifth season of the on-going space adventure.

The benefactors also added a statement explaining why they believe this campaign deserves such a substantial contribution:

"We think Star Trek and especially its latest incarnation, "Enterprise" is the kind of TV that should be aired more often. The people responsible at Paramount think this is just a show and we want to tell them, it is not. We are in the commercial space flight industry and would like to testify that at least one out of two of all the actual entrepreneurs involved in this industry has been inspired by Star Trek; and we are not only good at watching TV sci-fi , we are also good at writing checks, big checks. The people airing this kind of TV have a responsibility; inspiration. Star Trek has inspired us, and particularly Enterprise, with its superb theme song that tells so much about our struggle to move space travel forward and closer to the public, this inspiration is so self evident, that Virgin Galactic has ordered a 5-sub orbital ship fleet from Scaled Composites, a 100 million dollar investment, and the first one being built is going to be christened ‘VSS Enterprise.’ Now doesn’t that ring a bell in Paramount’s ears? Now, canceling the series so bluntly, for the sake of just ratings, tells very much about the kind of thinking going on inside Paramount. If we thought the same way, Paul Allen would have never funded the SpaceShipOne program. Sir Richard Branson would never have funded Virgin Galactic and Space Adventures would never have put two space tourists aboard the International Space Station. Instead, we would all be at home watching Survivor or some other reality TV show. Enterprise needs to be renewed, for the sake of fan loyalty, for being quality TV, for bringing imagination and hope for a better future to our homes, but over all that, for inspiring us so strongly that we have fought all our adult lives to bring that future closer to our children and to us."

TrekUnited Director Tim Brazeal also stated contributions like this one brings the campaign much closer to its goal. "We are overwhelmed at the generosity of these fellow Star Trek fans," Brazeal said. "We believe that Enterprise deserves a future. With contributions like the one from these generous individuals and those of millions of other Star Trek fans worldwide, we will succeed."

Under the terms of the TrekUnited charter, the campaign will be able to give the money to anything that will guarantee a fifth season of Star Trek: Enterprise. TrekUnited.com today announced that three anonymous contributors have stepped forward with a $3 million pledge toward the campaign to ensure a fifth season for the recently cancelled Star Trek: Enterprise.

Paramount Network Television and the United Paramount Network (UPN) jointly announced on Feb. 3 that this would be the last season of Enterprise on UPN. Fans pooled their skills, time and finances to form TrekUnited.com in an effort to fight the decision by raising money themselves to pay for a fifth season of the on-going space adventure.

The benefactors also added a statement explaining why they believe this campaign deserves such a substantial contribution:

"We think Star Trek and especially its latest incarnation, "Enterprise" is the kind of TV that should be aired more often. The people responsible at Paramount think this is just a show and we want to tell them, it is not. We are in the commercial space flight industry and would like to testify that at least one out of two of all the actual entrepreneurs involved in this industry has been inspired by Star Trek; and we are not only good at watching TV sci-fi , we are also good at writing checks, big checks. The people airing this kind of TV have a responsibility; inspiration. Star Trek has inspired us, and particularly Enterprise, with its superb theme song that tells so much about our struggle to move space travel forward and closer to the public, this inspiration is so self evident, that Virgin Galactic has ordered a 5-sub orbital ship fleet from Scaled Composites, a 100 million dollar investment, and the first one being built is going to be christened ‘VSS Enterprise.’ Now doesn’t that ring a bell in Paramount’s ears? Now, canceling the series so bluntly, for the sake of just ratings, tells very much about the kind of thinking going on inside Paramount. If we thought the same way, Paul Allen would have never funded the SpaceShipOne program. Sir Richard Branson would never have funded Virgin Galactic and Space Adventures would never have put two space tourists aboard the International Space Station. Instead, we would all be at home watching Survivor or some other reality TV show. Enterprise needs to be renewed, for the sake of fan loyalty, for being quality TV, for bringing imagination and hope for a better future to our homes, but over all that, for inspiring us so strongly that we have fought all our adult lives to bring that future closer to our children and to us."

TrekUnited Director Tim Brazeal also stated contributions like this one brings the campaign much closer to its goal. "We are overwhelmed at the generosity of these fellow Star Trek fans," Brazeal said. "We believe that Enterprise deserves a future. With contributions like the one from these generous individuals and those of millions of other Star Trek fans worldwide, we will succeed."

Under the terms of the TrekUnited charter, the campaign will be able to give the money to anything that will guarantee a fifth season of Star Trek: Enterprise.

[S McCall]

Seems to have been quoted twice in parts.....

Don't think it will make much of a difference as the two companies would probably want to avoid the embarrassment of a warp speed U-turn

[Jordan aka FltAdmlWolf]

I doubt it's going to make much difference now. There has already been so much hype around the "last episodes" on ENT, and they've been steering the plot towards a resolution (albeit without our knowledge...) since the beginning of this season.

While I'd rather see ENT go on and get better, it would also be nice for the franchise to rest -- and to come back without Brannon and Braga. Hopefully in a few years they will be pursuing "other interests" and someone else will have to take the help with (hopefully) more success.

[Kwame Alexander]

Everyone hear about the supposed ending? Do you think it is true?

[Idril Mar]

I wouldn't be surprised, considering the fact that it has been put out that the next ST Movie wil be covering the Romulan War.

[+ Makal Kora]

So will the next ST movie be a prequel like Enterprise?

[Idril Mar]

Dunno... but we're getting offtopic.

[Flash NOva]

This is pulled from Star Trek's news, I'm a little turned off by it...

04.01.2005

Enterprise Saved ... With Strings Attached

With Star Trek: Enterprise hanging by a veritable thread the last two years, a new direction for the show has recently been unveiled that is being hailed both as a triumph of corporate synergy for the Viacom-owned Paramount Pictures, and a way to keep the show on the air. If you recall news reports from last year, UPN agreed to renew Enterprise for a fourth season in exchange for substantially lowering the license fee it pays to Paramount for the show. In order to remain on the network for a fifth season, the license fee would have to be reduced even more — to a level at which, under normal circumstances, the sci-fi show would be impossible to produce.

Enter the darlings of Viacom-owned Comedy Central, Star Trek fans Trey Parker and Matt Stone, the creators of South Park. Parker and Stone, you may recall, also made Paramount's "Team America: World Police," which ran in theaters last year and comes out on DVD in May. The movie grossed only $50 million worldwide, but it turned a profit for the studio due to its low production budget.

"The pieces fall together brilliantly," said a top Viacom spokesperson. "Matt and Trey take over Enterprise, and it's all done with marionettes! It's like Thunderbirds and Captain Scarlet all over. Gerry Anderson, watch out."

The retooled show, under the new name Team Enterprise, will still feature the voice talents of Scott Bakula, Jolene Blalock, and most of the original cast. (Those who are not invited back to voice their character parts due to budget constraints will be invited to write an episode as compensation.)

The actors are excited about the prospect of continuing the show without the hassle of costumes, makeup and 16-hour workdays. "Now I won't have to get to work super early in the morning and sit in a chair for hours and hours getting appliances glued to my face before going on set," said Linda Park. John Billingsley, who was standing nearby, interrupted and pointed out that it was in fact he, not she, who had to suffer that particular indignity. Another actor requested the producers install a high-speed internet connection and a microphone at her house so she could just phone in her performance.

Parker and Stone have already started making a shooting model of the Enterprise NX-01, thus reviving an old Star Trek tradition. "We prefer the look of physical, tangible models over CGI ships any day," Parker said. "Of course, we have no visual effects budget whatsoever, so we won't be painting out the strings. You'll get used to it. Still trying to figure out where to put the propeller."

"We're also gonna re-do the opening title sequence," Stone revealed. "Record a new theme — something bombastic, action-oriented. Y'know, something that isn't, like, totally gay."

These ambitions may put the squeeze on an already bare-bones budget. But the new Trek producers can cut corners by utilizing existing props and sets from "Team America." So don't be surprised if Captain Archer looks suspiciously like Alec Baldwin, Trip Tucker like Matt Damon, Travis Mayweather like Samuel L. Jackson, T'Pol like Janeane Garofalo, and Malcolm Reed like Susan Sarandon. But it's all in good fun and shouldn't cause any more harm to the continuity of Star Trek.

Parker and Stone are looking forward to revealing, once and for all, the identity of "Future Guy": Kim Jong-Il.

And interesting aswell, BBC has purchased rights in order to do a remake of the original series, a British version of Star Trek.

[Jordan aka FltAdmlWolf]

Hehe. I hate April Fools. Too much foolishness.

[JSheriden]

This is a total bombarment of what Enterprise is all about. I hope this does not fall through.

[Jordan aka FltAdmlWolf]

This is a total bombarment of what Enterprise is all about. I hope this does not fall through.

::Snickers::

Everyone does realize that was an April Fool's joke, that article, right?

[Nathan Baker]

I agree Wolfie,

Anyone who was gullible enough to fall for that...

Well, my mother told me if you can't say anything nice...

[Aeryn Skylar]

Good advice from you mother, Nathan

[Flash NOva]

Lol. I forgot it was April fool's.

[Kwame Alexander]

Gosh, Enders games is one of my all time Favs

http://www.latimes.com/news/opinion/commen...omment-opinions

COMMENTARY

Strange New World: No 'Star Trek'

By Orson Scott Card

Orson Scott Card is the author of "Ender's Shadow" (Tor Books, 2000) and

"Ender's Game" (Tor Books, 1994). His most recent book is "Shadow of the

Giant" (Tor Books, 2005).

So they've gone and killed "Star Trek." And it's about time.

They tried it before, remember. The network flushed William Shatner and

Leonard Nimoy down into the great septic tank of broadcast waste, from

which no traveler

. No, wait, let's get this right: from which rotting

ideas and aging actors return with depressing regularity.

It was the fans who saved "Star Trek" from oblivion. They just wouldn't

let go.

This was in the days before VCRs, and way before DVDs. You couldn't go out

and buy the boxed set of all three seasons. When a show was canceled, the

only way you could see it again was if some local station picked it up in

syndication.

A few stations did just that. And the hungry fans called their friends and

they watched it faithfully. They memorized the episodes. I swear I've

heard of people who quit their jobs and moved just so they could live in a

city that had "Star Trek" running every day.

And then the madness really got underway.

They started making costumes and wearing pointy ears. They wrote messages

in Klingon, they wrote their own stories about the characters, filling in

what was left out - including, in one truly specialized subgenre, the

"Kirk-Spock" stories in which their relationship was not as platonic and

emotionless as the TV show depicted it.

Mostly, though, they wrote and wrote and wrote letters. To the networks.

To the production company. To the stars and minor characters and guest

stars and grips of the series, inviting them to attend conventions and

speak about the events on the series as if they had really happened,

instead of being filmed on a tatty little set with cheesy special effects.

So out of the ashes the series rose again. Here's the question: Why?

The original "Star Trek," created by Gene Roddenberry, was, with a few

exceptions, bad in every way that a science fiction television show could

be bad. Nimoy was the only charismatic actor in the cast and, ironically,

he played the only character not allowed to register emotion.

This was in the days before series characters were allowed to grow and

change, before episodic television was allowed to have a through line. So

it didn't matter which episode you might be watching, from which year -

the characters were exactly the same.

As science fiction, the series was trapped in the 1930s - a throwback to

spaceship adventure stories with little regard for science or deeper

ideas. It was sci-fi as seen by Hollywood: all spectacle, no substance.

Which was a shame, because science fiction writing was incredibly fertile

at the time, with writers like Harlan Ellison and Ursula LeGuin, Robert

Silverberg and Larry Niven, Brian W. Aldiss and Michael Moor[...], Ray

Bradbury and Isaac Asimov, and Robert A. Heinlein and Arthur C. Clarke

creating so many different kinds of excellent science fiction that no one

reader could keep track of it all.

Little of this seeped into the original "Star Trek." The later spinoffs

were much better performed, but the content continued to be stuck in

Roddenberry's rut. So why did the Trekkies throw themselves into this

poorly imagined, weakly written, badly acted television series with such

commitment and dedication? Why did it last so long?

Here's what I think: Most people weren't reading all that brilliant

science fiction. Most people weren't reading at all. So when they saw

"Star Trek," primitive as it was, it was their first glimpse of science

fiction. It was grade school for those who had let the whole science

fiction revolution pass them by.

Now we finally have first-rate science fiction film and television that

are every bit as good as anything going on in print.

Charlie Kaufman created the two finest science fiction films of all time

so far: "Being John Malkovich" and "Eternal Sunshine of the Spotless

Mind." Jeffrey Lieber, J.J. Abrams and Damon Lindelof have created "Lost,"

the finest television science fiction series of all time

so far.

Through-line series like Joss Whedon's "Buffy the Vampire Slayer" and

Alfred Gough's and Miles Millar's "Smallville" have raised our

expectations of what episodic sci-fi and fantasy ought to be. Whedon's

"Firefly" showed us that even 1930s sci-fi can be well acted and tell a

compelling long-term story.

Screen sci-fi has finally caught up with written science fiction. We're in

college now. High school is over. There's just no need for "Star Trek"

anymore.

[Jordan aka FltAdmlWolf]

Far be it for me to reject the opinion of a mediocre writer like Orson Scott Card, who's himself has surely never done anything to pander to the masses... But he goes TOO FAR!

Star Trek may have been "cheesy" and the "high school" of Sci-fi, but it did one thing that he did not mention: broke barriers. Star Trek was a watershed series in the 60s that, because of its marginality, was able to portray things which more mainstream shows may not have been able to. Lest we forget the groundbreaking interracial kiss, or the black-white/white-black episodes?

Yes, we have great sci-fi now, but the reason why ENT was cancelled has nothing to do with Trek being any less great of science fiction as the rest of what we see on television. The reason ENT was cancelled was because network executives make poor decisions based on skewed numbers. UPN is the absolute worst choice for a sci-fi show, and Friday is the absolute worst time for any show you're trying to garner support for. Furthermore, ENT was a risk to begin with. A good deal of the fanbase was not behind the show, and the choice of actors for this series (i.e.- our good Jonathon Archer) put a lot of people off. Nonetheless, ENT has slogged through some really poor writing, and some absolute butchering of the timeline, to finally come out with some really good storylines. There is so much to still be explored in the ENT era that we will never see. If the show had attempted to go back to the "roots" of the Federation and deal directly with the "much loved" species we all know, perhaps we would have been better off the beginning. (Why in the universe did they try and start things off w/the Suliban?)

Anyway, OSC has a right to his own opinion, but it's clear that he's never really understood Trek anyway. To avoid mentioning of the cultural impact Trek had from the very beginning just shows that you are at a complete loss for a true understanding of what a phenomenon Trek is.

[Varaan]

Okay, after those last two posts, anything I have to say is going to sound boring and unintelligent. But I'll say stuff anyway.

First, I agree with Wolf. As I read OSC's Opinion I couldn't help feeling that he totally missed what Trek was/is about. After every sentence I had a "well, what about this" comeback ready. I might not go so far as to say that Roddenberry was a genius (which some people believe), but he had a vision. And it's a heck of a lot better vision of the future than things like the Matrix, or the Terminator have. I don't know about the rest of you, but I'd like to live in a world where there's no suffering, no discrimination, no rich and poor, no persecution, and no good reason for mindless agression and violence. Warp drive, transporters, holodecks and the rest would just be icing on the cake. It's the changes in society and humanity that I'm interested in.

Now, a little back on topic (not that everything else was off topic) - Is it just me or did anyone else VASTLY PREFER the theme from the "In the Mirror Darkly" episodes over the soft rock ballady garbage that they've played for 4 years?

[Kwame Alexander]

I've been thinking a bit since I posted the Card Op.

This was in the days before series characters were allowed to grow and

change, before episodic television was allowed to have a through line. So

it didn't matter which episode you might be watching, from which year -

the characters were exactly the same.

I do think he's right in a sense, about TOS being bad scifi, in this passage I would agree totally. It's not untill the movies, that there was any character growth, and not untill the second one at that. Also in this passage to be fair, he's talking about TV as a whole, not just TOS

As science fiction, the series was trapped in the 1930s - a throwback to

spaceship adventure stories with little regard for science or deeper

ideas. It was sci-fi as seen by Hollywood: all spectacle, no substance.

Total garbage. TOS had not just one, but many episodes where they tackled issues that effected society then and still do today. On another note, sometimes when I sit down to watch Star Trek, I don't care about if it's saying somethin deeper. I think I'm preaching to choir on this one.

Anyway, I think that Star Trek is not dead but any means, I have been facsinated in the first few incarnations of Star Trek that spoke to the fact ofbeing able to reinvent it self and stay relevent. I think we have been seeing a sticking with the status quo with the first few season of Enterprise. However, this season has proven not only to be relevant, it also pays tribute to TOS in spectacular ways