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"Star Trek is dying." How would you sell it to a younger audience?

In a TrekCulture interview a week ago, Rob Kazinsky, who plays Zeph in Section 31, talked about his reaction to the S13 movie.

He revealed one interesting point from behind the scenes about why the movie was made:

When I got this job, I was like, "Ugh, Section 31 movie, why are they doing a Section 31 movie? It's gonna be hated from the get-go. No ones gonna want to watch a Section 31 movie. We're doing a TV-budget movie. This isn't going to be what people want..." And I spoke to Alex [Kurtzman] and I spoke to Olatunde [Osunsanmi] and they explained to me that Star Trek is dying. And I don't know if people know that. You know, I was talking about Star Trek at my gym where I fight. You know, I'm a boxer where I fight with a lot of kids - you know, I don't fight them but train them - none of them knew what Star Trek was. Could you imagine that?

He went on to say that Star Trek had never had a base as big as Harry Potter or Star Wars but the small fanbase was passionate. He says that fanbase is aging and "we are going to lose Star Trek if we don't bring in new fans, new eyes and new ways of getting people to love the things that we love."

I think that's a valid point but Section 31 is not the answer. It's not particularly interesting for kids (I think) or for adults, whether or not they're Trek fans already. And for fans, this type of storytelling sacrifices the optimistic ethos (though not immune from criticism along the lines of DS9) that's at the heart of the Federation and the franchise. And I'm not even arguing this from a canon or gatekeeping point of view. It's not utlilizing Star Trek's niche and unique selling point in the market. Why should kids watch Star Trek instead of Captain America, Suicide Squad, or any MCU movie?

Here comes the question: If you're in Alex Kurtzman's position, how are you going to sell the franchise to a new, young audience? How are you going to convince kids who spend their time playing Roblox and watching Mr. Beast that Star Trek is a good show to watch?

67 comments

  • There are plenty of good responses here already, but to me the main thing in marketing Trek to new audiences would be stop the frigging nostalgia fest.

    • don't circle back to the TOS characters at the tip of a hat. Yes, JJ Abrams, I'm looking at you, but also every other recent attempt at new Star trek movies.
    • All the stories around those characters have been told already. Make something new and current within the same universe.
    • Don't shoehorn canon and continuity onto every new show. Having Bones make a cameo in the TNG pilot was cute. Making Burnham a previously unmentioned lynchpin in Spock's character was... unnecessary. Don't get me started on SNW.
    • The wealth of continuity from previous shows shouldn't be a namecheck scorecard, but a backdrop that curious current viewers can track down and explore on their own.

    Twenty years ago when the BBC relaunched Doctor Who, they played down all the background stuff for most of the first season, only drip feeding lore to the audience.

    • The stories, the characters had to be appealing on their own
    • The 26 seasons worth of classic Who wasn't required watching to keep up, but it gave resonance to the new show.

    Star trek needs to learn from that approach to focus on good stories and engaging characters — and to aim outside of the established but dwindling fan group by allowing the almost 60 years of canon to play second violin.

  • Stop trying to be ‘cool’ (or whatever you think is cool). Star Trek was never cool. Just do Star Trek and the right people will find it.

  • Re runs and free yt uploads of TNG with advertising like "here's a future we can have, with quality leadership. Keep fighting for decency"

  • Sorry, I don't care what Kurtzman says about this (or an actor that is obliged to defend a project he was in) when it's justifying putting out schlock for mind share. If that's the best we can do, let it die - it doesn't make anything that exists any worse.

    Trek needs a good show that stands alone and isn't aimed at us but a fresh audience. That means no cameos, limited references, not animated (that is a stigma as much as I love LD), and actually taking the time to get people invested.

    Basically, they needed Discovery to not be garbage. I know non-Trekkies that were actually excited for a new sci-fi romp and got turned off almost immediately by the nonsense writing. Not the cast, or stupid out of universe concerns about being "woke" or some shit, just plain out "this makes no sense and isn't fun to watch" and it was hard to disagree.

    Everything since then has lived in Discovery's shadow in terms of new audience and has mostly dealt with that by being aimed at fans of 90s Trek and nobody else. Prodigy may be an exception here, but that suffers from being oriented at kids.

    • I agree in some senses with the stand-alone part, but not necessarily the animated part. I feel like it would just need to be marketed right. Executives are convinced for the most part that animation is either only for kids or for irreverent adult comedies, when it really should be viewed as a general medium.

      I think Infinity Train is the best evidence of my point (look it up if you don't know); it really transcends the typical bounds assigned to animation. Book 3 especially is truly just a great fantasy/sci-fi drama. However, it was basically killed by executives who wanted a tax write-off and couldn't see its potential outside a "kids show". Now some of the series is purchasable on various online storefronts, but the only way to watch all of Book 3 is to pirate it.

      If executives and people alike would liberate themselves from the stigma of animation, I feel like you could pull off high-quality, TNG-length seasons that allow less rushed charater development for a reasonable budget compared to an expensive live action streaming show. In some ways, Prodigy was an example of this - I felt like I got more time with the characters than almost any other modern Trek (granted SNW is still going on).

      I've never met a person where I mentioned Star Trek and they went, "Ew, Discovery. I'm never watching any Star Trek ever again"; I think Discovery had its flaws (and strengths), but it made little impact on franchise popularity.

      Usually (which you touch on), it's more like they're just bamboozled by the cannon. Like, I was watching DS9 once, and my roommate asked if it was the original, which then brought a long and complicated explanation from me. I think you're right that it'd be very nice to have a Star Trek show that one could show to people where when old lore is brought in, it's delivered in such a way that people can pick it up as they go.

  • Star Trek was never a show for kids, so it's not surprising kids don't know about it. Star Wars and Harry Potter were for kids

    Star Trek has always been more about solving things without violence when possible, which means action sequences don't happen often, so a significant portion of people won't find any interest in it.

    To me, personally, Trek fails at simply not having "anything really going on". I don't know about more recent Trek shows, but there's never anything that feels like a real threat, or any threat that goes beyond 2 episodes. Some of the exploration feels like "Oh, we're just fucking bored, I guess, let's see what we can find over that star system", everything feels unbelievably safe. Sure, Kardassian assholes might capture you and torture you for shits and giggles, you never know when something with literal godlike powers might decide to show up and challenge the crew out of boredom, but that's not a risk you're at while exploring a weird world or solving a Sherlock mystery in the holodeck. For comparison: Battlestar Galactica had a permanent worry about (lack of) resources, being a fleet on the run with a single military ship to protect it against an overwhelming enemy and an "anyone could be a sleeping agent of the enemy" conflict. Not everything BSG did was good, but that overall setting and premise permeated everything.

    Put another way, what would be the most common answer to "What is Star Trek about?"

    • I'd say it's about a lovely utopia where everyone is equal, money and poverty are gone and progression of humanity itself became the main driving force of everyone.

      Besides that it's about many encounteers with new species, discoveries, ethical and moral questions that are (tried to be) solved for the good of everyone. It's conversation, not conflict. It's discovery, not extinction. It's fairness, not exploitation. Et cetera.

      And I'd counter your argumrnt. There always is some looming threat. Voyager has a gazillion of enemies, the ever hanging threat of never coming back home and being stranded for good. TNG had...well...the Borgs? Sure, there are many soap-opera-moments, like the sherlock Holmes holodeck filler-episodes, but they're not defining elements I'd say.

      Star wars is like a western in space. Pew pew instead of bang bang. No wonder it's so much more loved than trek.

  • They really need to find ways to get Star Trek to an audience beyond Paramount+

    Hell, why not put the new shows on normal TV a couple of years after they air online? I know fewer people watch traditional TV these days, but it's still a way to get the show out to a more general audience

  • What is the age range they are classifying as young? Are they talking like teenagers or mid-20s to 30s? The thing with Star Trek that I think attributes to the non-fans not watching would be the stylization. Going back to the comparison of MCU, HP, and Star Wars: they all have something unique (be it the directing, photography, acting, writing, music, special effects, etc.) that if you pay attention for a significant period will find. Star Trek is no different. When you watch a MCU movie or TV show you probably see the sleek costumes and fast paced fight choreography. With HP, it was probably all the special effects, makeup and set design. For Star Wars it might be the writing, special effects and music.

    I’m being non-specific here of course. Star Trek like I said is no different. There are visual and non-visual language being utilized that we find enjoyment in. For anyone not currently into these properties, it could be difficult to enjoy. Especially if you haven’t been someone who watched these properties from a young age or from the early years. For example, if you had someone exposed to only the Kelvin Timeline try to watch TOS or TNG with no context for how it relates, a disconnect might form. Visually those series are not as sleek or modernized as those movies.

    As for the comparison to video games… that is simply a different medium. What appeals to one person to the next will be hard to gage. That doesn’t preclude the likes of Fortnite players from enjoying Trek, but culturally that kind of entertainment is very different from what a kid who grow up with TNG was exposed to.

    • I'm struggling to find it now, but I read a Jonathan Frakes interview last year (I think) where he expressed a similar sentiment.

      Basically, he said that the fans that he sees at conventions are getting noticably older, and there aren't as many younger people joining the fold.

      • He would be a better judge of that observation. However I was at STLV last year and there was a sizable number of younger fans (especially those who are teenage). Maybe not a lot.

  • I think the sensibilities of the audience has shifted since the new millennia. Multicam feels claustrophobic to the modern audience and that’s one of the main aesthetics of retro trek.

    The other thing is that every Trek series, aside from DS9, depicts a pretty rigid, hierarchical, militaristic environment. Maybe not as much as Klingons or Cardassians but I think this setting, the nomenclature, the general vibe is becoming alienating to a modern audience. Keep in mind, people have become highly cynical toward predominately white and Westernized institutions, and the Federation is very much that. It feels like America with Aliens on board. English is the only language ever really spoken aside from some alien languages.

    In my opinion, there needs to be a show that pulls heavily from DS9 while maintaining some of that optimism and sincerity we love from retro Trek. It needs to oscillate between these juxtaposed tones. The show should be told from the perspective of multiple equals that make consensus based decisions instead of a primary Captain like Picard, Sisko, or Janeway who supersedes all decisions. Everyone has specific roles but there is no hierarchy.

    Also, remove the white savior element that retro Trek holds over many of the beings they come across in the franchise. The group, whomever they are, would be far more interesting as some kind of nomadic space commune that is extremely removed from federation involvement. If anything, I’d say at most there is one person with ties to the federation but perhaps they left for unknown reasons providing rich backstory and future storylines if they do come across the federation.

    This perspective is more akin to the actual lens the average viewer sees the world. We are not making cosmic decisions, we’re just trying to survive. And, when we see the government, we see a dark looming presence hovering over us, trying to tell us the best way to live our lives, and it’s fucking annoying, right?

    That should be the New Trek.

  • I think the current approach is the correct one, even if it produces a few misses here and there.

    A variety of tonally distinct projects, aimed at different demographics, telling stories.

    • I'm inclined to agree, and the series from the past decade have definitely attracted a younger audience, though I'm guessing probably not to the degree the producers were hoping and also without holding onto as many of the olds as they were hoping.

      I also think the latter half of the 20th century was a unique time where families were sitting down to watch family-friendly (it's true don't deny it) TV like Star Trek together.

  • They had the good idea with the Kelvinverse as a more approachable, mainstream friendly variant to classic Star Trek. Then they made Discovery and killed all momentum, alienating both old and new fans.

  • It's dying because its repeating the old mistake of trying to go back to the exact same formula, and because it's less accessible.

    In my opinion, Paramount taking Disco off of Netflix, in favour of sticking it onto its own streaming service, was a mistake. Although it meant that people were less able to access it, either because Paramount Plus wasn't available in their region, or because they couldn't justify the cost of spending money on another streaming service.

    And in the meantime, it keeps trying to go back to the same thing. That was what killed it back at the start of the 21st century. Enterprise and Voyager were variants of exactly the same kind of thing as TNG, with better special effects. Everything keeps trying to go back in time, and cater to Nostalgia. Remember Captain Kirk? What about Picard? Or the Constitution-class Enterprise? There doesn't feel much like there's anything interesting in Trek any more. It's basically all rehashing or nostalgia.

    For all its flaws, part of what made Discovery interesting was that it was (not unlike the ship itself) an experimental testbed. Writers would, and did, just throw everything at it, for good and ill, and I'd argue it worked. Having that flexibility gave us the second wave of Trek, and I'd argue just as much that Discovery settled into being some kind of 32nd century TNG was either a harbinger, or hurt it severely.

    What Trek really needs for a revival is something that the network would never allow (CBS/Paramount would never risk their cash cow.), and that is to go back to its roots. Not in the Federation-and-Enterprise way, but in what made TOS.

    TOS stood out because it wasn't like the other cowboy shows at the time, or like the rocketty sci-fi of the era. It was distinct. It pushed the social-progressive line so hard it was nearly pulled off the air, and if Roddenberry had had his way with including an LGBT member in TOS like he'd wanted, might have done so outright.

    Newer Trek (TNG and onwards) is much safer and more conservative by comparison, to the point of being boring. It barely pushes the line, if at all. The Orville, by virtue of having less brand baggage behind it, arguably does a better job of being progressive.

    Visually, too. Every Federation starship basically follows the same template, even into the far distant future. Trek is not glued to the appearance of the Constitution-class Enterprise, or a variant of such for its hero ships, nor does every ship need to use warp engines and that.

    A minor side tangent, but reverting to the same kind of thing is why I was rather disappointed with what Discovery did with the 32nd century. It would have been far more interesting if they'd gone to a time when all the powers we know and are familiar with, and even the tech aboard Discovery were ancient and long-deprecated.

    Discovery in the 32nd Century, as an Equinox counterpart of the Voyager plot could have been amazing, both from them being an outdated starship in what used to be familiar territory and what it would mean to maintain Federation values when the Federation doesn't even exist any more.

    Honestly, I think bits of Picard and Strange New Worlds had the right idea when it came to the Synth ban, and the Illyrian extinction. Show us the downsides of Federation policy for things that might have been well-intentioned, but had negative or mixed effects, and how they fixed/improved it. That's something we've rarely seen in Trek, in a way that wasn't just "we don't like this rule, so we'll ignore it".

    Here comes the question: If you're in Alex Kurtzman's position, how are you going to sell the franchise to a new, young audience? How are you going to convince kids who spend their time playing Roblox and watching Mr. Beast that Star Trek is a good show to watch?

    The young audience isn't a monolith, and I'd argue that Star Trek is better off not competing head-to-head. Could you imagine DS9 or Voyager with their totally not-a-square radical groovy Teenage Mutant Starfleet Captain? It would be unwatchable. Hell would be upon us.

    Instead, Trek could benefit by competing through simply not competing, and stand out, rather than copy other sci-fi. Give us what Trek has always been, a nice slow comfort watch, where everyone is competent, and everything isn't always at stake or fisticuffs all the time. That may work to its benefit, when everything else is dark and gritty, since it would be distinct compared to other things.

67 comments