Why Did Star Trek:TNG Bomb on Blu-ray?

[cheez avenger]

Originally Posted by Clark Kent

CBS/Paramount constantly misread the Blu-ray television market. It wasn't just Star Trek, but I Love Lucy and Andy Griffith Show as well.

They would release one season at a time at exorbitant pricing, even for the U.S. market.

You could possibly get away with that on a new show still airing today. You can't get away with that on older television series with dying fanbases.

Like many I ended up importing all the various Star Trek releases from overseas, where they are priced much closer to their true market worth.

The average Blu-ray consumer is far more sophisticated than the average DVD consumer. Once the pricing disparity between domestic and equivalent foreign sets became widely known, it was always going to kill domestic sales.

Indeed. I paid less than $20 for that first season of I Love Lucy and am waiting for season two to hit that price mark or less. I will not overpay for media anymore unless it's a rarity.

[kidglov3s]

Originally Posted by StingingVelvet

Most people I know in real life think the $5.99 bin at Best Buy is a little overpriced in the days of The Pirate Bay. On Twitter I follow lots of fellow sociologists and professors, political writers and researchers, real professionals with high salaries... pretty much all of them casually mention illegally streaming or downloading anything not on Netflix. Don't even get me started on the students, they either use their parents' accounts or pirate everything on principle.

It's a new world, and paying for media is quickly becoming a niche market. Not enough Trekkies in that group willing to pay up. Is what it is.

I can't imagine living in a sea of bad compression and lossy audio in 2017. It's so weird and sad to think that's the norm for the vast vast majority of people.

[phobicsquirrel]

Originally Posted by kidglov3s

I can't imagine living in a sea of bad compression and lossy audio in 2017. It's so weird and sad to think that's the norm for the vast vast majority of people.

I don't get it either but in a world where people are fine with their netflix, amazon, hulu and all other forms of low quality content quality will be harder and harder to get.

[steve_dave]

Originally Posted by kidglov3s

I can't imagine living in a sea of bad compression and lossy audio in 2017. It's so weird and sad to think that's the norm for the vast vast majority of people.

The norm for most people are HD sets at out of the box settings enjoying audio out of the TV speakers.

Home theater enthusiasts are niche.

Home theater casualists are minority.

Home video watchers are majority.

We're talking about folks using Netflix and Hulu possibly along with Redbox. Or just Redbox in general.

[darkness2918]

Its on Netflix & Hulu so I can pretty much see it whenever I want. Ill eventually buy them at around $20 a piece when I get the chance.

[knight17]

Most of the people I know of are still happy with their DVDs and/or streaming content in addition to pirating movies and tv shows. With that being said, I can't afford to spend a great deal on an individual TV season either. I bought the set from UK by the way.

Apart from issues on the side of the consumer, all these multi billion dollar (as stated before) studios expect to sell several copies far too soon for far too much. I am pretty sure it still sells at a good rate.

The fact that they spent millions on restoration doesn't mean much since churning out copies with the masters afterwards is more or less equivalent to chump change. Give the process about 3-5 years and they should make a nifty profit but sadly they want it within about 6-9 months which is not feasible.

[calmblueocean81]

Do we know for sure that the TNG blus sold poorly? I honestly thought that the reason why no further show was receiving the HD upgrade was because DS9 and VOY just weren't as popular as TNG and so not worth the expense associated with HD upgrading.
I think I may have also read somewhere that the way DS9 was filmed (and the way effects were done) would make it much harder for them to restore in the same way they did for TNG. Someone might be able to confirm that. Think it was a Digital Bits article I read way back when.....

[Roonan]

Originally Posted by kidglov3s

I can't imagine living in a sea of bad compression and lossy audio in 2017. It's so weird and sad to think that's the norm for the vast vast majority of people.

We all settle for mediocre versions of products on topics we don't care as much, I'm sure. I can't blame people for doing the same with movies/TV series, even if I care.

[Phobics]

Originally Posted by calmblueocean81

Do we know for sure that the TNG blus sold poorly? I honestly thought that the reason why no further show was receiving the HD upgrade was because DS9 and VOY just weren't as popular as TNG and so not worth the expense associated with HD upgrading.
I think I may have also read somewhere that the way DS9 was filmed (and the way effects were done) would make it much harder for them to restore in the same way they did for TNG. Someone might be able to confirm that. Think it was a Digital Bits article I read way back when.....

I've heard similar stuff before but it's possible ds9 will be done. ST is a cash cow and is one of the biggest franchises but fans have continued to be treated badly from paramount.

[oddbox83]

I'm convinced it was a combination of unrealistic expectations and pricing strategy.

In the UK market, they were equally expensive when they came out but within a couple of months would be closer to £20. So pretty much everyone learned to have patience and save an absolute fortune! I bought them all but didn't pay full price for most. I wanted to support these from day one, but also I am neither rich or stupid when I saw the discounting so soon after release.

The lack of a bigger box set so soon at the end of the season releases also was likely a mistake as some people wanted the complete set, and the issue with releasing some movie length cuts separately but not in all territories left things inconsistent. They also should have been in the complete box set, as the "complete" set as it stands doesn't have the complete documentary extras.

Setting Enterprise, which didn't need HD restoration, at the same price point as TNG which had masses more work put in was also a bit ridiculous and no doubt has coloured expectations of sales of other spin-off series.

[thecalm_7]

Originally Posted by kidglov3s

I can't imagine living in a sea of bad compression and lossy audio in 2017. It's so weird and sad to think that's the norm for the vast vast majority of people.

On your way to work or anywhere, look at traffic. Specifically bull bars/off road bumpers/skid plates/etc 95% of them are not safety rated. Most will inflict more damage to the vehicle itself much less protect it from further damage. Yet people do it because of cost. I doubled my shop size to accommodate these customers crappy decisions. (Repairs and installing tested parts)

A more comparable idea is music industry, MP3 and streaming. Then the people on the LP forums complain about CDs., most MP3 and steam are nothing compared to their physical counterparts. So few artists will release flac or other lossless audio.

In my family, I am the only one I can think of that owns movies on disc. Most stream or pirate. It's a shame. My wife's employees, they are younger than us. None of them pay for media. Pandora, Spotify, Netflix, they don't even bother downloading.

[Geoff D]

Originally Posted by BluBonnet

I think a lot of Star Trek fans are simply tired of being treated like the ATM by CBS/Paramount, they just come to the fans for a quick buck and they try to hit the fans for all the $$$ they can.

Disney is a lot better at milking the fans dry, look how many people still eagerly buy anything that's Disney / Marvel / Star Wars and still seem to be craving more...

The twist is that THIS time the upgrade really was worth every penny, rather than the incremental steps from VHS to LD to DVD for which CBS always charged an arm and a leg, natch. But this was one trip to the Bank of Trek too many for several folks, and the wider ignorance of - or worse, sheer indifference to - the extensive remastering process (which we've been discussing in the DS9 wish list thread) only compounded the issue.

Basically there are lots and lots and lots of reason why this failed. Bottom line is that we don't get DS9 on HD any time soon.

[drush9999]

There's not great demand from TV channels worldwide to purchase DS9 in HD either. This was probably the main reason.

[Gizz]

You have to look at the times that we live in here in the UK the sets were priced so high but they went down. I know that a lot of work went in to the Blu Rays but I could not spend £ 60 I think they were priced per season so I waited. The Same with The X- Files set.

[tenia]

A combination of factors, à la Venn diagrams :
- ST: TNG, while not being that old, is not a new release, and catalogue titles remain a niche, so the consumer base is small to begin with.
- On top of that, ST is only interesting a part of this niche.
- It's on BD, again another niche.
- Finally, the seasons were released through expensive individual releases, which ended up making up for way too high of a total amount, that would clearly have been made cheaper by waiting for price drops or the inevitable boxset, thus people creating a slow pace of sales.
- And on top of THAT (but this one might just be me), I thought the release calendar was spacing out the releases too much. Because the restorations were progressing along the course of the releases, it took 18 months to get all of them, instead of the common approach "drop the Complete Series boxset and be done with it".
- And did I tell about creating exclusive extras for the season finales through individual releases of them, meaning that despite waiting and paying a lot, you still could have missed on some extras ? Yeah, that wasn't a good idea either...

So :
- a niche of a niche of a niche
- expensive products + spaced out individual releases
- and exclusive extras meaning you feel you're buying an incomplete product
= flop

[Geoff D]

Originally Posted by drush9999

There's not great demand from TV channels worldwide to purchase DS9 in HD either. This was probably the main reason.

There wasn't a ton of clamour in the wider world for TNG in HD either though. These shows are in constant circulation around the world, being fabulously inoffensive schedule filler, and that's part of the problem. There's no mystique left, no hype, and as mentioned it's been part of the streaming firmament for years already (being free content on some subscription services IIRC) which only added to the blasé reactions to the expensive (not for what it is, but in this day and age) HD Blu releases, which were also drawn out across a lengthy schedule as mentioned above.

[The Sovereign]

From the various responses here, it's easy to see why Trek fans didn't rush out en masse to pay list prices for these. I'm sure some did, while others waited for prices to come down. Most - like me - have paid their pound of flesh at the Trek altar already, and if I can save a little here or there, I will. I think the studio will survive, but if they decide to stop putting out quality product, it will be a sign to me that I should find other ways to spend my time and money.

[Geoff D]

I won't argue with the almighty Sovereign, my Guild dues are all up to date, I swear!!

[dissention]

The Trek brand has slowly deteriorated over the past 20 years and with the way Paramount has seen Trek fans as perpetual cash cows, it's no wonder that the tits were raw by the time they released $80 seasons on Blu. They spent a lot of time and money on restoring the show, but aside from die-hard Trekkies, the market wasn't there to support their investment.

It sucks for us collectors because the real money these days is in streaming vintage shows, not physical media. For some of these shows, physical releases are an afterthought. When shows like The West Wing can command $200,000 an episode for a streaming service to license, the studio isn't going to rush to put them on Blu; it's an unnecessary investment for diminishing returns when they can just collect a check from Hulu or Netflix with much less overhead.

[OneWayFilms]

When the powers at Paramount visit the Star Trek conventions and they are surrounded by Extreme Trekkies who beg, squeel, cry and demand anything and everything regarding Star Trek, it's easy for Paramount to think this would be a major success.

Personally, I'm THRILLED they upgraded and gave the series the love and care it needed, it TRULY never looked or sounded better. I KNOW that was an expensive investment on their part, but not EVERY FAN is as extreme as the Convention Trekkies who live in their parents basements and will throw all their money on costumes, comics and action figures.

Most of us are common normal middle class citizens with families who work hard jobs and live week by week, barely getting by who can't afford to spend the well-deserved $80.00 per season.

So the only choice we have is do without until the price drops to an affordable sale price and then we get scolded for not buying it earlier and paying FULL PRICE for it. We get blamed for Paramount not releasing DS9 or Voyager. Jeesh.

Like I said, I'm GLAD they did upgraded it, I KNOW it cost money and uped the price for us, but we can't spend what we don't have. It's THAT simple.