TV Series instead of Films

Dr. Arroway wrote:This belief is reinforced by the only real known (to me) counter-example: Game of Thrones.
It's the first Fantasy TV-series where production values rival those of big-budgeted movies, the costumes look great and, oh!:
everyone watches it.
Sure, there's the mature themes, the sex and the Zeitgeist effect, but I'm convinced that with the cheesy-looking sets and costumes of the fantasy TV series of old it would have bombed or just found the usual smallish, niche-sized following.

...I have neither watched nor read Game of Thrones.
Same for Wheel of Time.
As for Battlestar Galactica, the original was great (although the second season was... a sad case of Sequelitus)
The re-imagined BSG, though, gave me a headache.
Too much bouncy-cam and so many cuts that it seemed like they were swapping between cameras every other word at times. Not cool. Too much MTV-influence.
The opposite end of cuts can be found in Babylon 5 where there is a 5 minute scene without a single cut. Although there is no action (it's a conversation between Ivonova and Zathras), the mere fact that a TV show can do a scene that long without needing more cuts than an enraged caffeine-overdosed treecat is a hopeful sign.

Michael Everett wrote:snip an enraged caffeine-overdosed treecat is a hopeful sign.

Love the description. My daughters equivalent is "a hyperactive chipmunk on crack"

Well I and my family do WATCH GoT, I even managed to be an extra for two seasons so I know how much tears, sweat, hard work and money is being poured to make that show as good as it is.. But main issue here is money and making a HH tv series on anything less than a sizeable budget (akin to the one HBO gives to GoT) would make the tv series problematic. There are all sorts of science fiction tv series on ATM and the audience is getting more and more picky. Props, costumes and screenplay would have to be top notch, not to mention VFX. Getting a well-known actor or two would also be required to garner some attention from the uninitiated and you still may not have a hit tv series like GoT.

Well I never meant that literally everyone is watching GoT.
For that matter, I never meant that they should (I do enjoy it, but I'd have my own share of criticism to do about it, and it certainly isn't fit for everyone).
That said, it is a hit and a cultural phenomenon: references about it and its characters can be found just about anywhere by now.

Anyway my point stands: sure, it's possible to do nice little dramas with the right actors and little resources, but if you want to do Fantasy (or "worse", Science Fiction, or worse still, Space Opera!), you have to do it with adequate investments, or you can never hope in a good reception.
That is my consolidated experience (as an observer) with this kind of things. Of course, I might be wrong.

Also a testament to skill of the actors involved. Here's hoping the Honorverse will attract as good a cast.
(I just reached season 5 in my re-watch of B5 this weekend, incidentally )

Michael Everett wrote:[snip]
The opposite end of cuts can be found in Babylon 5 where there is a 5 minute scene without a single cut. Although there is no action (it's a conversation between Ivonova and Zathras), the mere fact that a TV show can do a scene that long without needing more cuts than an enraged caffeine-overdosed treecat is a hopeful sign.

Yes, budget-intensive would be a mild term if they aren't to reuse the same stock sequences over and over.

A quick perusal of the (always reliable) internet brings us this comment:

"Babylon 5 is produced on a per-episode budget of roughly $800,000, quite low for a science-fiction series; "Star Trek: Deep Space Nine," by comparison, has a budget of roughly $1.6 million per episode, and Fox's "Space: Above and Beyond" is rumored to cost $2 million."

Now I have always held that "Below and Behind" would be my preferred position in any fighter-plane space analogy . Still, I would think that (from this, and given inflation) $3-4 million per episode, plus a startup "CGI, set & costuming" budget of say $10 million would be the absolute minimum starting point.

Hopefully a lot of the CGI development cost will be sunk cost already held by the initial movie, but new graphics and etc. would need to be paid for ... and CL-56 would be the least of the challenges! Them Stilties don't animate themselves y'know (probably going to be an even harder row to hoe then Nimitz , though undoubtedly not less thankful ).

Dr. Arroway wrote:[snip]
Anyway my point stands: sure, it's possible to do nice little dramas with the right actors and little resources, but if you want to do Fantasy (or "worse", Science Fiction, or worse still, Space Opera!), you have to do it with adequate investments, or you can never hope in a good reception.
That is my consolidated experience (as an observer) with this kind of things. Of course, I might be wrong.

hvb wrote:Hopefully a lot of the CGI development cost will be sunk cost already held by the initial movie, but new graphics and etc. would need to be paid for ... and CL-56 would be the least of the challenges! Them Stilties don't animate themselves y'know (probably going to be an even harder row to hoe then Nimitz , though undoubtedly not less thankful ).

I think you are misunderstanding. The proposal is not to do a tv series after the first movie. The proposal is to do a tv series instead of the movie.

hvb wrote:Also a testament to skill of the actors involved. Here's hoping the Honorverse will attract as good a cast.
(I just reached season 5 in my re-watch of B5 this weekend, incidentally )

Michael Everett wrote:[snip]
The opposite end of cuts can be found in Babylon 5 where there is a 5 minute scene without a single cut. Although there is no action (it's a conversation between Ivonova and Zathras), the mere fact that a TV show can do a scene that long without needing more cuts than an enraged caffeine-overdosed treecat is a hopeful sign.

Yes, budget-intensive would be a mild term if they aren't to reuse the same stock sequences over and over.

A quick perusal of the (always reliable) internet brings us this comment:

"Babylon 5 is produced on a per-episode budget of roughly $800,000, quite low for a science-fiction series; "Star Trek: Deep Space Nine," by comparison, has a budget of roughly $1.6 million per episode, and Fox's "Space: Above and Beyond" is rumored to cost $2 million."

Now I have always held that "Below and Behind" would be my preferred position in any fighter-plane space analogy . Still, I would think that (from this, and given inflation) $3-4 million per episode, plus a startup "CGI, set & costuming" budget of say $10 million would be the absolute minimum starting point.

Hopefully a lot of the CGI development cost will be sunk cost already held by the initial movie, but new graphics and etc. would need to be paid for ... and CL-56 would be the least of the challenges! Them Stilties don't animate themselves y'know (probably going to be an even harder row to hoe then Nimitz , though undoubtedly not less thankful ).

Dr. Arroway wrote:[snip]
Anyway my point stands: sure, it's possible to do nice little dramas with the right actors and little resources, but if you want to do Fantasy (or "worse", Science Fiction, or worse still, Space Opera!), you have to do it with adequate investments, or you can never hope in a good reception.
That is my consolidated experience (as an observer) with this kind of things. Of course, I might be wrong.

Just some interesting stuff:
- The episodes of the first season of ST:TOS cost between ~$175,000 and ~$250,000+, averaging ~$190,500. On an average "per episode" basis, they were pretty much the most expensive 1-hour scripted series ever on television up to that time. (There were variety shows with heavy star presence that were more expensive, due primarily to talent costs, but "Ed Sullivan" was not sweating his ratings spot.)
- TOS was significantly more expensive to make per episode than the habitual ratings topper "Bonanza", which was itself widely renowned for its expense per episode. ($100,000 - $150,000).
- Modern "Dr Who" episodes are made on a budget of ~1M pounds sterling (+) per episode (~$1.57M).

dreamrider

The point that GoT wouldn't have been successful without it's comparatively huge budget and extremely convincing sets, buildings and costumes is well taken.

Those points are by no means the only ones that made that success possible of course (excellent story, characters, superb actors also being huge factors).

Still: without the budget the series would have been a non-starter.

So I agree that for the Honorverse this means that a Mini-Series COULD be fantastic - (for me much preferrable to 2-hour cinema movies actually because a TV series offers so much better story-telling possibilities) - but whether cinema or TV: The Honorverse would ONLY work on a pretty big budget.
Finding that is a major stumbling block I bet. We can count ourselves very lucky if Evergreen manages to conjure the funds somehow.

I'll keep my thumbs pressed.

Bruno Behrends wrote:
Still: without the budget the series would have been a non-starter.


Finding that is a major stumbling block I bet. We can count ourselves very lucky if Evergreen manages to conjure the funds somehow.

I'll keep my thumbs pressed.

I wonder if Evergreen has considered some form of crowd sourcing, i.e. kickstarter?

I would love to see a TV series of HH. But, I would like to see it using the designs, ship, uniform, etc, as seen in House of Steel. I think that the glitzy, no, gaudy, designs put forth in the comics served a purpose, to draw in a new/movie audience, but I think the more stately and subdued designs of BuNine would serve a TV re telling much better. Since one wouldn't have to hurry the 'audience training' along with vastly disimiler visual cues.

Just my two cents.