Why Star Trek didn't make it

[Timsup2nothin]

So, a very interesting topic is in danger of being derailed with Star Trek drek. I figured we could move that here, out of the way. This is how we got from groking yourself to the demise of Star Trek.

See the Wikipedia article Grok for numerous definitions of the word "grok."

It became part of the science fiction community's vocabulary in the 1960s, particularly when Star Trek came along (Stranger in a Strange Land predates Star Trek by 5 years). When Star Trek fandom became a thing, there were buttons and bumper stickers with the slogan "I Grok Spock" (no, I don't have either of those in my collection).

So yes, it's a word, but one that most people never encounter.

LOL...okay, Stranger in a Strange Land is on the library of congress list of "books that shaped America," was the first SF title to appear on the NYT best seller list, is the number one selling title by one of the early giants of the genre, and has been described as a 300+ page exploration of the word 'grok,' ...but of course in the world according to @Valka D'Ur all of that is too obscure and it was freakin' Star Trek fans noticing that it rhymed with Spock that really brought grok into recognition as a word. The irony being that Spock, by his nature, would never grok anything.

Star Trek only ran for three seasons so it wasn't very popular in its own time, either!

Not long after its cancellation, NBC realized that Star Trek was the show with a perfect fit for the audience demographics in terms of what their advertisers were looking for. If they'd had that information a few months sooner, Star Trek probably wouldn't have been canceled.

That was over 50 years ago. For a show that its creators thought would be forgotten, it hasn't done that badly, even considering that the movies from V onward have been crap, along with Enterprise and Discovery. There's still enough fanfic to keep me happy for years.

Star Trek didn't get cancelled so much for lack of ratings as for Roddenberry being a wad of a sort that network executive of the time did not have much experience with. His incessant demands for creative control far beyond what the network felt like he merited got Star Trek shoved into a horrible time slot where, no surprise, the ratings fell off enough to justify cancelling it altogether.

Some of his demands, in retrospect, were social justice ahead of its time but they caused a lot of problems for the network. There were a number of affiliates that refused to air the show because of the idea that the future wouldn't have segregated star ships...and the black on the bridge was a woman no less. I admire the guy for sticking to his guns on it, but rubbing the networks nose in it with Kirk kissing Uhura overplayed his hand.

Other stuff didn't have the justification of being "the right thing to do," it was just ego blowing wildly across sound stages and back lots. He treated scheduling like he was Cecil B DeMille rather than a relative unknown with a not terribly successful TV show and made enemies across the spectrum.

 

[warpus]

I know absolutely nothing about the subject (i.e. TOS and its cancellation) but I'm glad interracial and intergender kissing on TV is ok now

 

[Zkribbler]

The third season was terrible!

Much later, I heard Roddenberry tell of getting his "Gene baby" call:
"Gene, baby, we have this great idea! We'll have one episode set in a Western town, and we'll get all the Western fans. Then we'll have a murder mystery episode, and we'll get all the murder mystery fans. We'll have a hippie episode, and we'll get all the hippies watching. This is going to be great!"
Roddenberry knew then that his show was doomed.

 

[Birdjaguar]

It wasn't a very good show despite being a good idea.

 

[Lillefix]

"Gene, baby, we have this great idea! We'll have one episode set in a Western town, and we'll get all the Western fans. Then we'll have a murder mystery episode, and we'll get all the murder mystery fans. We'll have a hippie episode, and we'll get all the hippies watching. This is going to be great!"

Donald Trump who called?

 

[Berzerker]

I grew up on Star Trek, for 3 years anyway

 

[Zkribbler]

Donald Trump who called?

Naw. In the Donald's call, he was asking to be in the Nazi episode.

 

[Sommerswerd]

As much of a Star Trek fan as I am... I never really got that into TOS. It was just too campy and corny. I love the TOS movies, but the show was just too low budget. I've learned to like some of it in retrospect, but I can remember as a kid thinking "ugh, Star Trek TV show"... all that changed when TNG came out though.

I can see why some network execs might have found it too niche.

 

[hobbsyoyo]

Gene Roddenberry was a first class asshat by every account I've read. He had a friend write the theme song of the show, then he secretly wrote lyrics to go along with it so that he would get half the royalties as a songwriter despite the lyrics never being used or even intended to be used. A lot of what was wrong with the first couple-three seasons of TNG was his meddling with the show. All of the stupid Luxwana Troy episodes were just so his wife could be a star (she was the actress for that character in addition to the voice actress for the computers in TNG, Voyager and DS:9 until she died).

I did not know that his asshattery got the original show cancelled though.

But yeah I don't really enjoy TOS. I've actually seen a couple of episodes of the animated series and it's not half bad, or at least what I've seen isn't terrible.

 

[rah]

Yeah it was cheap and campy, but if you were a teenager growing up at the time, it was great. America's race to the moon was in full swing, and it portrayed a world that was at peace while protests of the war were abundant. For any science fiction fan there was just nothing to match it. Previously the only real science fiction on tv had been the twilight zone and the out limits which weren't really the same thing. Or old replays of the of movie serials like Flash Gordon and Commander Cody. Now there is a lot of variety and better productions, but back then it was all on it's own.

 

[Farm Boy]

Sometimes I just want to watch Kirk take the problems of our world and punch them in the face.

 

[Broken_Erika]

The third season was terrible!

Much later, I heard Roddenberry tell of getting his "Gene baby" call:
"Gene, baby, we have this great idea! We'll have one episode set in a Western town, and we'll get all the Western fans. Then we'll have a murder mystery episode, and we'll get all the murder mystery fans. We'll have a hippie episode, and we'll get all the hippies watching. This is going to be great!"
Roddenberry knew then that his show was doomed.

By the Third season they had pretty much sidelined Gene 'cause the studio wanted the show to be more "Mainstream" or something, they made the hippie episode in an attempt to capture the young audience and make it more appealing to pop culture of the time....

 

[Gori the Grey]

Three years isn't a bad run, though.

And it "made it" in spawning the numerous movies and reboots.

 

[Timsup2nothin]

Yeah it was cheap and campy, but if you were a teenager growing up at the time, it was great. America's race to the moon was in full swing, and it portrayed a world that was at peace while protests of the war were abundant. For any science fiction fan there was just nothing to match it. Previously the only real science fiction on tv had been the twilight zone and the out limits which weren't really the same thing. Or old replays of the of movie serials like Flash Gordon and Commander Cody. Now there is a lot of variety and better productions, but back then it was all on it's own.

Danger Will Robinson! I think you missed something!

Now, before you say that Lost in Space was cheap and campy, remember that you just said that about Star Trek.

 

[warpus]

All of the stupid Luxwana Troy episodes were just so his wife could be a star (she was the actress for that character in addition to the voice actress for the computers in TNG, Voyager and DS:9 until she died).

Oh man, I hated those episodes so much.. Whenever that lady showed her stupid mug I'd just sigh.. It was a new TNG episode so I was of course going to watch it, but I knew that it was going to suck. I didn't understand why the hell they would ever put that lady on the show, and even create episodes that revolve around her..... .. Years later I found out who she was and it all made sense. She was a LOT better as the computer. i.e. actually good

Episodes revolving around Alexander were almost as bad, but not quite. He wasn't nearly as annoying as Lxwanna, but the Alexander episodes were just so.. stupid.

I tried watching a couple TOS episodes and they were all pretty bad. Not to take anything away from them, I'm sure they were good for their time, but the acting seemed subpar, and everything else was obviously not as good as what we're used to today. The fight scenes were just ridiculous. I guess they couldn't afford to hire a guy that says: "No that's not how people fight at all, that looks stupid".

I became a Star Trek fan during the TNG run. I grabbed my imagination. Then years later Voyager came along and crushed it

 

[rah]

Danger Will Robinson! I think you missed something!

HOW COULD I HAVE FORGOTTEN THAT. Getting old sucks. Yeah, I always watched it also. NO matter how bad it was. And it was really bad.

But I think the movie was even worse.

 

[Gori the Grey]

Also, on the whole "didn't make it," think of the things that even just in its three year run it contributed to pop culture:

Spock is just a flat-out instantly recognizable character and character-type (if you want an icon for hyper-logical, he's your go-to guy)

• plus the mind-meld and
• "Live long and prosper" (that's like a thing you can say to someone in RL and it works as a felicitation but also fondly recalls all the good associations with the show)

"Damnit, Jim, I'm a doctor, not a . . . "
Redshirts
The whole everyone-thrashing-left-and-right-on-the-bridge-while-the-ship-is-rocked-by-some-tumult thing
Communicators (there was a stage of cell-phone development when they essentially took the form of a ST communicator)
"Phasers on stun"

One could probably think of half a dozen more. It "made it" more memorably into our collective psyches than shows that have run five times as long.

 

[warpus]

Don't forget "Beam me up, Scottie", which was apparently never even said on screen. (So I'm curious why it's so popular of a saying)

 

[Berzerker]

Brings back memories, Lost in Space, the Outer Limits, Twilight Zone... and the Invaders. I preferred the Outer Limits, more hardcore and mind bending than the others.

Oh its a Mad Mad Mad Mad World

 

[Timsup2nothin]

It "made it" more memorably into our collective psyches than shows that have run five times as long.

This pretty much supports my opening statement. Even though it was somewhat...lacking...as far as access to the kind of special effects that make a space show workable they produced so many cultural icons that there was no commercial or financial reason to cancel it, other than controversies Roddenberry created...and even those could have been balanced into the bottom line if he hadn't alienated the network so badly in the process.

Aside to the Lwaxana Troy haters...Roddenberry's wife not only played her, and the computer voice throughout...before she married him she was also Nurse Chapel in the original series as well as the unnamed "Number One" on Captain Pike's Enterprise in the original pilot that got remade into "The Cage." Roddenberry is sometimes given credit for writing in a female first officer, but this was another place he made no friends with the network since they couldn't get behind the female first officer as an avante guard for feminism in light of him casting an unknown and untalented actress for the part just because he was having an affair with her at the time.