I think you’re not remembering the amount of silliness on previous shows, let’s analyze TNG S2:
Serious Episodes 59% (13 episodes)
- “Where Silence Has Lease” - “Loud as a Whisper” - “The Schizoid Man” - “Unnatural Selection” - “A Matter of Honor” - “The Measure of a Man” - “Contagion” - “Time Squared” - “The Icarus Factor” - “Pen Pals” - “Q Who” - “The Emissary” - “Peak Performance”
Not Serious Episodes: 41% (9 episodes)
- “The Child” (Troi’s immaculate space-conception) - “Elementary, Dear Data” (“Holodeck gone wrong” story) - “The Outrageous Okona” (Data learns comedy) - “The Dauphin” (Shapeshifting monster princess) - “The Royale” (Another “holodeck gone wrong” story with no holodeck) - “Samaritan Snare” (We are smart) - “Up the Long Ladder” (Space irish) - “Manhunt” (Lwaxana Troi is on the hunt for a husband) - “Shades of Gray” (A clip show)
I think it’s a good proportion of silly so far…
MurrayL@lemmy.world 2 days ago
Because it’s impossible to get the execs to approve a 23-episode season of almost sitting these days, let alone sci-fi, and one of the (many) criticisms of Discovery was that it was lacking the more offbeat episodes and character pieces that helped define Trek’s golden age.
Rock and a hard place.
AlexLost@lemmy.world 2 days ago
Costs are a big factor. Shit costs a lot of money to make nowadays. They used to use cheap cardboard and foam, models for shops flying through space, etc. now it all takes time and money to make us all go WOW!
stargazingpenguin@lemmy.zip 2 days ago
Yeah, that is sad. I enjoy seeing futuristic aliens and ships too, but I guess I’ve never really understood why a lot of these shows have to look like movies now. I would be perfectly happy to see them cut those fancy effects way back and spend some of that money on some good writers to make a few more episodes. I’ve found I very rarely remember how good the CGI monster or alien building looked, but I often remember what the characters said.
No, I’m not as old as I sound! ;-)
CmdrShepard49@sh.itjust.works 2 days ago
Not judt costs but the production schedule for the actors and crew. 23 episodes is one every 2 weeks with just a couple weeks off for the entire year. This also lead to a lot of garbage filler episodes regardless of the series. I do prefer more that 8-10 episodes but 20+ is a bit much too.