StillPaisleyCat

The television expansion of the Monsterverse rolls on with the imminent launch of *Monarch: Legacy of Monsters* 2nd season — three weeks from now on February 27th!

I’m hopeful to persuade some folks here on Lemmy to embrace the Monsterverse and discuss the new season of Monarch: Legacy of Monsters here. I’m open to modding a new community here on StarTrek.website as there has been for Dr. Who, and have been enquiring with the mods. Any interest here?

Apple released new key art as well as a Titan focused 2 1/2 minute full trailer this week.

Kurt and Wyatt Russell return in the principal role across time periods, Anna Sawai anchors the young generation.

And a prequel spinoff helmed by Wyatt Russell is already announced.

The Hollywood Reporter has the details and links.

Ok, I appreciate that Bill Shatner has seemingly no personal shame when it comes to blatant vulgarity in salesmanship.

It also seems clear that Paramount’s new owners seem to have no bounds on the pop culture limits they will assail go get higher profile.

But nothing prepared me for the new *”Will Shat here”* Super Bowl ad campaigns for *Raisin Bran* ! 🥹

And certain crusty and reactionary Star Trek fans are worried about Starfleet Academy damaging the professionalism and dignity of the franchise. !🤦🏼‍♀️🤣

Star Trek fans have become very sensitive to introductions of new characters, aliens or historic events arguing that things that haven’t previously been mentioned ‘break canon’ or disrespect lore.

This piece by Inverse shows how profoundly TNG retconned Federation, Starfleet, and main characters’ history on the fly.

Worth thinking about.

February 27th will mark the season 2 premiere of Apple’s Monarch Legacy of Monsters starring Anna Sawai and Kurt Russell.

The teaser released yesterday promises a new kaiju, larger than Godzilla or King Kong.

However, there was another low key announcement 4 weeks ago that Apple has a spinoff already in development.

Right now, the new show is simply known as ‘Untitled Young Lee Shaw Spin-Off’ – here’s a synopsis: “The spinoff series will follow the story of Colonel Lee Shaw, an American operative who in 1984 went on a secret mission behind enemy lines in an attempt to stop the Soviets from unleashing a horrific new Titan big enough to destroy the U.S. and turn the tide of the Cold War.”

Wyatt Russell, has consistently had excellent critical reviews, but his profile has been rising since his recent appearance as John Walker in Marvel’s Thunderbolts.

Curious to know if there are other Monsterverse fans here on the instance who would like to discuss.

Editing to add the following quote from the Hollywood Reporter coverage

“Viewers around the world haven’t been able to get enough of ‘Monarch: Legacy of Monsters’ since its global debut, and we cannot wait to unleash the electrifying new stories that Joby and the entire cast and creative team have been working on,” said Morgan Wandell, head of international development for Apple TV. “With Joby at the helm, and alongside our terrific partners at Legendary, this new spinoff will kick off an epic Monsterverse expansion that brings audiences even closer to their favorite Titans, along with fantastic character-driven storytelling.”

Although Paramount+ now streams all the live action Star Trek shows in Canada, BellMedia’s CTV Sci-fi Channel has continued to provide linear cable programming for many of the Star Trek shows, including Strange New Worlds.

It wasn’t clear whether Starfleet Academy would also be available on CTV in first run. It’s now appearing in the television listings with a double episode premiere starting at 9:00 pm Eastern Time.

Despite a rebuff of an initial offer to buy Warner Brothers - Discovery, David Ellison is continuing to talk about it.

Meanwhile, WB-Discovery CEO Zazlav looks to be trying to split off the linear business and market the studios, IP and library.

Lots of interesting comments in the interview.

One that stood out to me:

The Duffers emphasized that they don’t plan on becoming prolific producers of a large stable of shows and films. “We don’t want to become like Bad Robot,” Matt Duffer said, name checking J.J. Abrams’ production company. “Ross and I are incapable of juggling that many things.”

“Media conglomerate putting together majority cash offer for WBD backed by ultra-rich Ellison family, reports say”

The Wall Street Journal, this Guardian article and other business news media are reporting that the rumoured Warner Brothers - Paramount merger is back under consideration — this time with the deep pockets of the Ellisons.

One can see it as a worthwhile investment for the Ellisons regardless whether the motivation is acquiring IP or media control.

Disquieting for Star Trek franchise fans nonetheless.

Treklit has some great offerings. The Relaunch universe books in particular developed coherent serialized storylines and a group of strong authors. There is also a deep library of standalone books from across all eras of the franchise.

By contrast, serialized Star Trek is struggling onscreen. Of the current era, only Prodigy has excelled in serialized storytelling.

So, why not look to the books? Not just to lift an idea like Control or the end of the Borg, but to actually tell a coherent narrative across a season or season?

On Netflix, Prime and Apple, it’s become established that successful streaming shows are often based on novels and novel series. Those streamers have come to understand that novelists, not scriptwriters, excel in laying out long form storytelling, and resources are often better put in having the screenwriters adapt than create from the whole cloth.

Reading a recent interview with Mick Herron, author of the critically acclaimed and popular Slow Horses on Apple, with a second show based on his other books launching this fall, I was struck by the interviewer’s assertion of this truism.

I thought about several of the non franchise shows I enjoy and how many of them are more or less faithful adaptations of books.

I was also struck by the thought that both Skydance and Paramount are quite capable of producing excellent book adaptations for Netflix and Apple. Murderbot is a very current example.

So, what’s holding back Star Trek from exploiting the Vanguard series or the Starfleet Core of Engineers books?

Why insist on giving showrunners resources to keep retelling franchise stories with legacy characters and tropes?

Why not exploit that IP that Paramount already owns by adapting the best of decades of TrekLit?

During a panel with Picard season three showrunner Terry Matalas and Todd Stashwick (Shaw), were questioned about a ‘30-page outline’ for the Star Trek Legacy concept.

Reportedly, Michelle Hurd (Raffi) mentioned this during an earlier panel.

It sounds as though there’s nothing new in terms of interest from the executives about the concept, just fan interest and an ongoing campaign. Matalas and Stashwick are focused on the upcoming Marvel limited series Vision Quest in which Stashwick stars as the Paladin.

What’s interesting to me is that the more I hear about Matalas original pitch, the more I dislike. Matalas confirmed that it would have a Klingon focus.

While I loved the deep dives into Klingon lore in the 90s, I would prefer something new in the 25th century even a show featuring legacy characters.

As well, Matalas confirmed that they proposed that Shaw would a holographic recreation rather than revived by Borg nanites. We don’t need another grumpy hologram now that the Doctor is back in both Prodigy and Starfleet Academy.

I would find Shaw’s journey as a victim of the Borg with survivor guild to someone who accepts that his own life depends on Borg technology as much more interesting, compelling and new ground in terms of a character arc.

Edited to correct Michelle Hurd’s family name…

Variety reports that “Brian Robbins Calls Paramount-Skydance Merger ‘Bittersweet’ in Memo to Staff Amid His Exit as Co-CEO”

David Ellison, the founder of Skydance, will become chairman and CEO of Paramount. Andy Gordon, who leads the West Coast office of RedBird Capital Partners, is set to take the role of chief operating officer and chief strategic officer. RedBird teamed with Skydance to acquire Paramount Global for $8.5 billion.

Looking at how Paramount, since 2021, has failed to deliver on a new Star Trek movie, arguably wound down three successful shows prematurely, it’s difficult to see that this leadership team has done well by the franchise.

Looking at the apparent expeditious compromises Paramount leadership and Shari Redstone were willing to make to clear the way for the sale, I’m willing to look forward to see what comes next.

We picked up some good deals from the promotion this week.