Paramount+ Star Trek: Discovery - Official Thread (1 Viewer)

[Sam Favate]

You would think they'd make it easier to sign up for the streaming service, especially since the first week is free. I tried doing so through my (original) Apple TV, and no dice. Failure after failure. I did sign up on the website, through Google, but that registration has yet to translate to my Apple TV, meaning I can't watch it on the TV (just the computer). If I can't watch on the TV, I won't watch it.

CBSAA has failure written all over it.

 

[Joseph Bolus]

I’m not excited about this new series right now either, but I’m definitely going to view the first ep Sunday night — and will sign up to CBS All-Access for at least the first 4 eps.

We’ll see how it goes after that ...

 

[Nelson Au]

Wow Sam, that's unfortunate you had such trouble signing up. I can only guess that you needed the more current Apple TV and app working together. It was very fast and easy as I said in my earlier post signing up with the Apple TV 4. So you got me curious, I have an older Apple TV 3 in the family room so I just tried to get CBS All Access working on it too. After going through the authetification process of entering a code from my iPad after it asked you, it then asked me to enter my password and it's working on the Apple TV 3. I also got it working on the iPad via the CBS app on it. I just broke down and watched a couple of the promos on CBS All Access on the Apple TV 3 for Discovery, a profile of Burnham, the props, the musical score.

I guess with the premiere only several hours away, I'm actually getting a little excited to see what they've come up with. The promos certainly are designed to do that. I've been neutral all during the gestation phase of this series and up through production. So now I want to see if they delivered. They certainly appeared to have put money into this.

Now I'm wondering how the premiere works, where should I watch it. We know it's going to premiere on CBS network TV Sunday. And I was going to watch it there originally. But since I have All Access now, should I watch it there? . I did watch The Good Fight premiere on CBS and it was interesting that it was cleansed for network TV standards, but I saw an uncensored clip online and more colorful language was used. My sense is the All Access version of Discovery isn't going to be any different given the show. But maybe I'm wrong as I think the producers said this venue gave them more freedom. So I guess we'll see.

 

[Blimpoy06]

The preview clips show Discovery as TV-MA. There may be a difference in what broadcast will allow vs. streaming. I'm sure there will be a higher amount of violence than most Star Trek's have presented before due to the subject matter. You may want to look at All Access anyway because it was announced they are doing an "After Trek" segment live after the show.

 

[Nelson Au]

Thanks Darin, I have not reading too much about the series, so I didn't know about the After Trek segment. Or that it's got that mature rating.

 

[Dave Upton]

An interesting perspective that helps explain the financial viability of the new series. Netflix is covering 75% of the per episode production costs just with their licensing deal.

http://www.latimes.com/business/hol...rek-cbs-streaming-service-20170923-story.html

 

[DaveF]

Is it available through Netflix?

 

[Blimpoy06]

Is it available through Netflix?

It's available on Netflix for areas outside North America. The USA will be a CBS All Access exclusive. I'm not sure how Canada is getting it. I've heard the SPACE channel may have it. No idea about Mexico.

 

[Sam Favate]

Rated MA? Wow, we've come a long way since the days of Star Trek The Motion Picture being rated G.

My 8-year-old kids were interested in seeing the new show. Looks like it will not be appropriate.

 

[Bryan^H]

So TV MA? In the same ballpark as Dexter, GOT, Twin Peaks, The Walking Dead. Got it.

This is absurd. I knew it was going for a more "gritty" angle, but there is no reason that any Trek series, ever should receive this rating. Trek has always been a series that should be enjoyed by young and old alike, and nothing against the shows I mentioned above, but STD should not be an adult only series. It just shouldn't.

I Will watch the pilot, but unless it is simply one of the best openers I have ever watched, I will not see another second of the series.
High expectations, but with every thing I dislike already stacked against it, that is a pretty fair trade.

 

[Josh Steinberg]

Is it available through Netflix?

No, you must subscribe to CBS All Access for a monthly fee in order to view this show. Only the pilot episode is being broadcast on the traditional CBS network.

 

[jcroy]

At minimum, lets hope CBS releases this show on dvd/bluray/4Kbluray for those who refuse to subscribe to CBS streaming service and/or do not want to resort to piracy.

It would be extremely aggravating if CBS wants to play further hardball, by NOT releasing it on dvd/bluray/4Kbluray.

 

[Matt Hough]

For East Coast viewers, there is likely to be football overrun tomorrow night, so I added an extra hour to the record time to cover it.

 

[Josh Steinberg]

At minimum, lets hope CBS releases this show on dvd/bluray/4Kbluray for those who refuse to subscribe to CBS streaming service and/or do not want to resort to piracy.

It would be extremely aggravating if CBS wants to play further hardball, by NOT releasing it on dvd/bluray/4Kbluray.

Since Trek is one of their biggest sellers on disc, I would expect this to get released at some point.

However, since it's also going to be used to drive subscriptions, it wouldn't surprise me if the release pattern is a little bit different than usual. The first season may not come out on disc immediately before the start of a potential second season, as is the case with most shows. I'm guessing it could be more like the Marvel-Netflix shows in the state, where there doesn't really seem to be any rhyme or reason for which shows come out on disc and at what time.

 

[jcroy]

Since Trek is one of their biggest sellers on disc, I would expect this to get released at some point.

However, since it's also going to be used to drive subscriptions, it wouldn't surprise me if the release pattern is a little bit different than usual. The first season may not come out on disc immediately before the start of a potential second season, as is the case with most shows. I'm guessing it could be more like the Marvel-Netflix shows in the state, where there doesn't really seem to be any rhyme or reason for which shows come out on disc and at what time.

(This is purely speculation).

If I had to guess, my suspicion is Disney/Marvel releasing the dvd/bluray sets of their Netflix shows might possibly be dictated by what agreements were signed. Especially if there was a precisely defined "exclusivity" time period stated in the original paperwork signed.

In the case of the Star Trek shows, it appears CBS also owns the dvd/bluray/4Kbluray/holodeck+ rights. So possibly the release schedule for such dvds/blurays/4Kblurays, might be driven (or unmotivated) more by Les Mooves than anything else. Star Trek may very well be highly "vertically integrated" (in Dilbert style "corporate-speak") within the CBS corporation.

 

[Neil Middlemiss]

Rated MA? Wow, we've come a long way since the days of Star Trek The Motion Picture being rated G.

My 8-year-old kids were interested in seeing the new show. Looks like it will not be appropriate.

The show runners explained that it would be more like hard PG-13 (Star Trek: First Contact was rated PG-13, as were other Trek films).

 

[Josh Steinberg]

I'm sure there's a very specific reason that the Marvel shows on Netflix aren't being rushed to disc. Netflix is different from a TV network. When, for example, Fox airs a new season of a show, those new episodes stay On Demand for a period of time, but eventually become unavailable for free streaming. The network has an incentive to keep the last few weeks of shows available so that viewers who miss an episode can see it and not get hopelessly lost because they've missed an episode. It's to their benefit to have those shows on demand because it supports the actual broadcast ratings by making it possible for people to catch up and stay with the show. After the season ends, then there are bonus reasons for getting a DVD done as soon as possible - it's still fresh in people's minds, its release promotes the next season going to air, and may encourage people who missed it when it originally aired to see it before the next season starts.

With Netflix, this changes because all programs are always available all the time. So, it doesn't help Netflix if Daredevil comes out on DVD. Netflix gets subscribers by having content that isn't available anywhere else; if you can just buy Daredevil on DVD, you don't need to subscribe to Netflix. And, on the flip side of that, since Daredevil Season 1 didn't disappear from Netflix before the start of Daredevil Season 2, if you're a Netflix subscriber you don't need to run out to buy Season 1 on disc because there was never a time when you didn't have access to it on Netflix.

So I think with this being on CBS All Access, a service that doesn't seem to be doing that well or drawing a lot of subscribers, they need to have something buzzworthy that brings in new subscribers, and they need to keep them. If Star Trek Discovery comes out on disc right away, that hurts the value of the subscription. On the other hand, if there is no disc, people wanting to watch the show will then be forced to buy a subscription to see it. If a second season happens, people interested in catching up on the first season will need to subscribe to the service. I get the sense that CBS really wants to use Trek to drive subscriptions, so the longer it remains exclusive to the service, the better chance they have of accomplishing that goal of using the presence of Trek to boost revenue.

 

[jcroy]

Until recently, I would agree Star Trek dvds were probably hot sellers for CBS + Paramount. (Dunno about the blurays).

This is judging by the sky high prices the dvd season sets of the Star Trek franchise shows which they were able to maintain for over a decade, until about a year ago or so. When CBS/Paramount started to release those shelf-friendly/low-budget complete series sets for the Star Trek shows, that's when I started to suspect they might not be hot sellers anymore. (More recently, I've been noticing local dump bins being filled up with the older Star Trek franchise season sets for $15 a pop or less).

Only Les Moonves knows for sure whether it is viable to release this new Star Trek series on dvd/bluray/4Kbluray, or whether it is a better bet to not release it at all.

 

[Dave Upton]

Personally, I think the MA rating is necessary given how gritty they want to be with the conflict, Trek has always had to tone it down somewhat to make ratings, but this time they don't want to. I am looking forward to tomorrow night.

 

[Josh Steinberg]

Until recently, I would agree Star Trek dvds were probably hot sellers for CBS + Paramount. (Dunno about the blurays).

This is judging by the sky high prices the dvd season sets of the Star Trek franchise shows which they were able to maintain for over a decade, until about a year ago or so. When CBS/Paramount started to release those shelf-friendly/low-budget complete series sets for the Star Trek shows, that's when I started to suspect they might not be hot sellers anymore. (More recently, I've been noticing local dump bins being filled up with the older Star Trek franchise season sets for $15 a pop or less).

Only Les Moonves knows for sure whether it is viable to release this new Star Trek series on dvd/bluray/4Kbluray, or whether it is a better bet to not release it at all.

At this point, putting out the reduced costs sets was a good strategy. (I used to work for a home video label so even though I have no affiliation to this specific company, I can see the mindset operating behind some of these decisions.) The individual season sets had been out for a long, long time, and retained high value despite the rest of the market tanking. Like HBO with their super expensive discs for their super short seasons (I think the current season of Game Of Thrones was only about six episodes, and HBO will be charging about $100 for the season set when it comes out.), people were willing to pay a premium for Trek for a long time. But at the same time, they never redid any of the discs. By not doing upgrades or remastered versions constantly, the way some other studios do, fans got the message that it was this or nothing. So, eventually, pretty much everyone who wanted one bought one.

At this point, releasing (for example) "Enterprise" in a complete series configuration is a no-brainer. The individual season Blu-rays have been out for five years at a retail price close to $100 a season (Amazon usually discounts to about $50 a season). I would be willing to bet that they got every possible sale out of those titles that they could possibly have gotten. By putting them out now as cheaply as possible, they'll get additional sales from people who otherwise hadn't been inclined to buy the earlier discs - they'll now get some casual fan purchases that they wouldn't have gotten at all at the higher price point. I'm probably one of them. I bought Enterprise S1 on BD when it first came out because I hadn't seen the show before. It was nearly $100, but I did it anyway. I thought the show was okay, but maybe not worth that kind of money for me personally. When I finished the first season, I discovered that I had access to the complete series in the same HD quality on at least two different streaming services (Netflix and Amazon Prime) that I had subscriptions to. So it was free for me to watch those. I finished the show streaming instead of waiting for the discs to come out. Those episodes have remained available for streaming in the five years since the disc came out, so I've never had a reason to buy the disc. It was only when the complete series set came out, and I saw that I could get the rest of what I was missing for less than the cost of one additional season that I did it. But frankly, it's a purchase I didn't have to make because I could still watch it for free on any of those streaming services at any time.

Right now, CBS is more interested in promoting All Access than they are for discs. They know Star Trek fans are likely to pay a little more for the privilege of watching Star Trek than most other fans are for most other shows. They're looking at their sister network, Showtime, and how something like "Twin Peaks: The Return" didn't do much for broadcast ratings, but had unprecedented streaming numbers for the company -- record numbers of people signed up for the streaming version of Showtime to watch that show. That's what CBS wants to duplicate with Star Trek on All Access. As long as Star Trek Discovery is exclusive to All Access, CBS can use it to promote the service. The show is currently scheduled to run from November to March, I believe, but if they keep it exclusive on All Access for a year or longer, they'll always be able to use it for subscriptions. If the show finishes airing in March, and a DVD came out in April or May, what reason would there be for anyone to sign up for All Access? But if the show finishes in March but remains exclusive to All Access for months or years, they'll be able to use it to drive new subscriptions even when they don't have new content.

Once their data starts showing that people aren't watching it on the service anymore, or that new paid members aren't signing up specifically to see it, that's when they'll have an incentive to put it out on disc. Then, they'll get a whole new sales boost from people who saw it on All Access but want to own the physical item, as well as from people who don't do streaming or who didn't want to take out a new subscription. But CBS cares far more about launching All Access and developing that service than individual disc sales. It's no different than when Voyager was used to launch UPN.