When You Lose Interest In A Series You Once Liked

[The Liturgist]

The idea of pain as we age scares me.

It shouldn’t, in my case I have an hereditary illness with aggravating factors. Its statistically unlikely you would experience the same discomfort. It only became apparent in my case well into adulthood as pain I had historically normalized or written off earlier in life became impossible to ignore.

 

[The Liturgist]

And Tribbles were 14 years old when they were plagiarized into a Star Trek episode, a Martian Flat Cat is the same by any name.

Thank you for doing Heinlein some justice by pointing that out.

 

[The Liturgist]

I like the response of just calling it "growing up". Also, a large draw of SciFi was the concept, the what if. I guess that when the ideas are nearing a quarter of a century old, and have been growing in familiarity all that time, they just lose their shine a bit.

If SF is based purely on the speculative plot element as opposed to on other concepts it is vulnerable to becoming yesterday’s news, or lack thereof, such as the case may be. Not so much growing up, but the passage of time.

 

[Tom D]

Most people don't realize they got free will, it's a precious gift from God.
If one doesn't use his free will, he is not a free person.
Humans got free will

 

[JacquelineDeane55]

My mom is a Jane Austen fan. I have watched Pride and Prejudice with her so many times that I told her I was not watching it again anymore. It got boring and dull.

 

[BPPLEE]

Not new episodes of series you like, but when you revisit an episode you once did. I was a Star Trek fan from when the original episodes first aired. Tonight I found one of my favorite TOS episodes on, The Trouble with Tribbles. I watched it and didn't enjoy it that much. There were mildly amusing moments, such as Spock declaring himself immune to the trilling effect of tribbles, all while he was stroking one (and this was noticed by his shipmates), and Kirk's dressing down of Scotty for the brawl. But...I didn't enjoy it. This is was an episode that never failed to delight, until now. Obviously it's myself that changed, not the episode.

Has this happened to you? Have you gone back to an episode of a series or a film that you once liked, but now find it kind of "meh?"

I was excited to get a copy of Ragtime, I had enjoyed it so much all those years ago but now I find it boring

 

[JohnD70X7]

Not new episodes of series you like, but when you revisit an episode you once did. I was a Star Trek fan from when the original episodes first aired. Tonight I found one of my favorite TOS episodes on, The Trouble with Tribbles. I watched it and didn't enjoy it that much. There were mildly amusing moments, such as Spock declaring himself immune to the trilling effect of tribbles, all while he was stroking one (and this was noticed by his shipmates), and Kirk's dressing down of Scotty for the brawl. But...I didn't enjoy it. This is was an episode that never failed to delight, until now. Obviously it's myself that changed, not the episode.

Has this happened to you? Have you gone back to an episode of a series or a film that you once liked, but now find it kind of "meh?"

I was a diehard fan of most everything Star Trek. TOS 100%. TNG 50-70%. ENT 100%. VOY and DS9 not so much... then along came DISC which I tried to like but only repeat watched episodes 1 / 1 and the series finale. From it came SNW which I liked so much I started a Facebook page that got as many as 27k members. Then the strikes and delays upon delays between seasons 2 & 3 occurred. And I ran out of ways to keep interest in the FB page members and me personally. Then season 3 came and it was under whelming to say the least. "Jumping the shark" as they say in the business. And at the end of the 10 episode season it hit me "this is not worth waiting even a few months for another 10 episode season. So I lost interest in the series and the whole Star Trek genre. I shut down the FB page.

I had some minor interaction with Hollywood behind the cameras elites. And I can assure you they are more threatened by new / other talent than they are at getting quality entertainment out to the audiences. Which is more frustrating than I can put into words. So many good writers, producers, actors, crew are turned away by these elites.

 

[The Liturgist]

So I lost interest in the series and the whole Star Trek genre.

I refuse to let Kurtzman-era woke trash ruin classic Trek for me. It’s a pity Paramount / CBS didn’t sell Trek to the chap who did The Orville and Family Guy; he might be a secular humanist, but he at least was a true fan who understood Trek, and The Orville felt more like Trek than anything produced by Alex Kurtzman.

 

[JohnD70X7]

I am currently toying with a project in the brainstorm phase, involving man's venture out into space (Space Venture)... involving a more probable means of transportation than warp (wormhole transit via kugelblitz technology to create temporary black holes using just light itself) with more realistic time frames (i.e. cutting the ties with ground bound humans whose time is out of sync with space venturers).

But as I said, I have gone back into online ministry and such projects (the above) take too much time. When I retire in 7 years I may give it more consideration.

 

[The Liturgist]

I am currently toying with a project in the brainstorm phase, involving man's venture out into space (Space Venture)... involving a more probable means of transportation than warp (wormhole transit via kugelblitz technology to create temporary black holes using just light itself) with more realistic time frames (i.e. cutting the ties with ground bound humans whose time is out of sync with space venturers).

But as I said, I have gone back into online ministry and such projects (the above) take too much time. When I retire in 7 years I may give it more consideration.

Space Venture is also the implied name of the spacecraft being prepared for launch at Space Mountain at Disneyland. You here it referenced in the comchat.

The SF epic I’m close to completing uses a slight jest for how the interstellar travel works (making the design theoretically possible to falsify, but no scientist would risk it, since what you’d probably wind up with is a carcinogenic neurotoxic fire, and it is highly improbable. However, I am for a hyper-realist treatment of the effect of the drive system: all movements through space are movements through time, so if one wants to avoid time dilation, one has to accept time travel as part of that. Thus much of the SF aspects of the book deals with how a civilization functions across different regions of spacetime. I’m also a stickler for realistic relativistic behavior of spacecraft in terms of orbital mechanics and manuevering.

I am also in the ministry, albeit as clergy, but I’m too ill to serve the liturgy right now, so I am focusing chiefly on this and on improving my knowledge of AI systems.

 

[Tuur]

I was a diehard fan of most everything Star Trek. TOS 100%. TNG 50-70%. ENT 100%. VOY and DS9 not so much... then along came DISC which I tried to like but only repeat watched episodes 1 / 1 and the series finale. From it came SNW which I liked so much I started a Facebook page that got as many as 27k members. Then the strikes and delays upon delays between seasons 2 & 3 occurred. And I ran out of ways to keep interest in the FB page members and me personally. Then season 3 came and it was under whelming to say the least. "Jumping the shark" as they say in the business. And at the end of the 10 episode season it hit me "this is not worth waiting even a few months for another 10 episode season. So I lost interest in the series and the whole Star Trek genre. I shut down the FB page.

I had some minor interaction with Hollywood behind the cameras elites. And I can assure you they are more threatened by new / other talent than they are at getting quality entertainment out to the audiences. Which is more frustrating than I can put into words. So many good writers, producers, actors, crew are turned away by these elites.

I enjoyed the first-run episodes of TOS and reruns for a time. Had the James Blish novelizations of the episodes. Was in my teens when I came across a Trek fanzine and...well, I got the impression some took it way too seriously and that reduced my interest.

Since The Trouble with Tribbles, have seen Mudd's Women, and while not my favorite, could see where it could have easily been made into a script for various Westerns of the era, with the Venus Drug a placebo all along. Have seen part of The Tholian Web, and it seemed to hold up better.

 

[JohnD70X7]

J. J. Abrams BASF approach to well established genres like Star Trek and Star Wars does have a freshness appeal to it. But the content betrays his "not getting" the basic concept of each. Admittedly, some of it is the resistance of old dog fans to new tricks (which at times gave George Lucas and Gene Roddenberry headaches). But after the newness of Star Trek 2009 wore off, I was putting together a film concept of rebooting the J.J. universe back to the original Star Trek universe around 2010 or so (before any of the sequels or new streaming series).

FYI BASF used to have the motto "we don't invent skateboards, we make skateboards better..." My use of the term "BASF approach" is the tendency of J. J. and others (including myself) of adding to an established / preexisting story line rather than coming up with something completely new.

 

[JohnD70X7]

I drove Mr Abrams in 2007 in the limo business. He was being treated to a set of laser fitted golf clubs by Dennis Hopper (who I also drove). Hopper was the actual client, and I drove both from Hopper's extravagant fortress home in L.A. to Taylormade Golf in San Diego. Mr. Hopper and a biographer working on his autobiography were in the back of my sedan and J.J. Abrams rode shotgun... assisting me at times through intense L.A. traffic.

Once we arrived at the Taylormade compound, I screwed up Dennis Hopper's name to the gate guard. I said: "client Dennis Hopkins." J.J. leaned over from the shotgun seat to correct my mistake to the gate guard "Hopper! Dennis Hopper..." I thought I was going to die. But the incident served me in 2016 or thereabouts in trying to pitch my Star Trek script (Fractured Universe) to J.J. via his Bad Robot production company.

I wrote that I was the limo driver that screwed up Mr Hopper's name. I did not get past the screener, but they did inform me that Mr. Abrams recalled the incident but was not interested in a script.

 

[JohnD70X7]

The basic premise of Star Trek Fractured Universe built on TOS episode the Alternative Factor where two Lazaruses threatened to occupy the same universe at the same time. Note that two Spocks occupy the same universe at the same time in the J.J. universe. My premise is that Kirk and Spock in TOS were right about the destruction of a universe, just not the immediacy of it. The "winking out" of that episode was from the tunnel between the two universes being traversed by the two as "the door opened and then closed."

But everything that changed in the J.J. universe ( George Kirk's death, the destruction of Vulcan and its people, etc. ) were the result of two Spocks occupying the same universe at the same time. Curved space time itself began to unravel at an increasing rate. Spock Prime had to go back to his universe or the J.J. universe would die.

Then through a series of mishaps and an unexpected heroine's sacrifice, the universe itself reboots to an earlier stage (in the TOS timeline).

 

[JohnD70X7]

But you can't suggest anything to know-it-alls.

 

[RDKirk]

I got to the point where Tim Allen was riding with the aliens he didn't know were aliens, then I chose to do something else and never went back to it. That was likely because I was never into the con scene, and that's how it opens. Then again, there was never a con nearby. Still, though I might enjoy a show (and I had the James Blish novelizations), it was ultimately entertainment. I don't look down at cons, just they aren't my cup of tea.

Galaxy Quest is not really satire. Satire is criticism, and Galaxy Quest is not a criticism of Star Trek.

 

[RDKirk]

Yes! This is happening. We scan the internet - waiting for the next dopamine rush - paranoid that if we spend to long on one thing we'll miss out on the other. Our reading these days is minimal - it's all YouTube shorts. If we read, we read the top 3 paragraphs only. Books? What's that? Some of us used to scuba-dive down deep into a book - now with the internet it's like we're a world of jet skiers zipping across the top of dozens of very deep subjects.

It's not all just a matter of seeking the dopamine rush.

It's also Internet formatting, which strives to keep you attached as long as possible (to get all the more advertisement to you). I can tell when they're stretching out the article or the video instead of getting to the point, and when I detect that, I'm annoyed even if I stick through it to get all the information.

 

[RDKirk]

Some recent Sci-Fi is awesome.
The Expanse, Last of Us, 3 Body Problem and even swashbuckling fun with "Mech's meet Mad Max" in Fallout.

Tony Gilroy's Andor is awesome.

"This was a 1500-page epic novel about revolution and fascism and rebellion that I'd been really excited about my whole life and didn't really have an opportunity to put anywhere. This was it." -- Tony Gilroy (creator of the Bourne trilogy)

Not only is the writing and direction smashing, but everyone involved in the production brought their A-game. Acting, set design, cinematography, scoring, it's all high art. Students of political science and the cinema arts and sciences will be writing about Andor for years to come.

The first season brings cheers and tears, but the second season will leave you blubbering...and liking it. Young people argue that it's written about today's incidents, but people old enough can see that it merely points out the way history repeats itself.

Andor is Doctor Zhivago for the 21st century, and I think Gilroy had that in mind.