Monster Media 1994 #1/monster.zip/monster/TEXT/STLB0294.ZIP/VOYLOGBK.TXT

Text File | 1994-01-31 | 12KB | 193 lines

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 │                       The STAR TREK: VOYAGER LogBook                       │
 │                            Advance Information                             │
 └─ 1995? ────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────────┘
                             compiled by Earl Green
     special thanks to those who have passed information along (see below)


from the Boston Globe:

                      PARAMOUNT WILL LAUNCH FIFTH NETWORK
                          by Josh Hyatt, Globe staff

   Call it "Network TV: The Next Generation."  Paramount Communications Inc.,
producer of two series based on the "Star Trek" show, yesterday said it would
launch a fifth broadcast TV network in January.  Currently the target of a high
profile takeover battle, Paramount said it would anchor its initial two-night,
four-hour lineup with yet another hour long "Star Trek" incarnation called "Star
Trek: Voyager."
   Though the company was sketchy about other details - revealing nothing about
programming plans or the exact nights it would target - Paramount said it was
joining forces with Chris-Craft Industries Inc., owner of six independent TV
stations in such top markets as New York and Los Angeles.  With the addition of
Paramount's own four stations, the new network would reach about 27 percent of
the country's households.  Paramount and Chris-Craft will jointly own and
operate the new network.
   John A. Wentworth, a spokesman for the Paramount Television Group in Los
Angeles, said that Paramount "has been and will continue to speak with other
station groups, as well as original programming sources."  Peter Temple, general
manager of WLVI-TV ([Boston] channel 56), which runs all of the current Star
Trek series, said he had not been contacted by Paramount.  "As the 'Star Trek'
station, I'd be angry if they didn't come and offer it to me first," he said.
"We would be interested in that kind of affiliation."
   While analysis agreed there is room for a fifth network - with enough
independent stations increasingly starved for programming as staples like sports
and movies switch to cable - some questioned whether Paramount was serious about
starting a network.  Both QVC Network Inc., the home shopping service, and giant
cable operator Viacom Inc. are competing to take over Paramount, which is
considered desirable because of its massive production studios and huge TV and
movie library.
   One analyst suggested that the Paramount Network - announced on the second
day of Viacom's attempt to enlist Paramount shareholders in its effort - "might
be intended to underscore the lucrative synergies" of a merger with Viacom.
Viacom has created such popular cable programming as MTV and Nickelodeon.  In a
statement, Viacom termed the network a "milestone event" and cited it as "one
more example of the limitless potential that makes the future of Paramount
Viacom so exciting."
   Competing bidder Barry Diller, QVC's chairman, has told investors that he
might sell off Paramount's TV stations, analysts said.
   But Diller, who as chairman of Fox Television built the Fox Network -
launched in 1986, when pundits suggested that viewership could no longer even
sustain three networks - has also said that he would develop a fifth network
around QVC.  In addition, programming giant Time Warner Inc. has also been
attempting to launch a fifth network, aided by former Fox executive Jamie
Kellner.
   Wentworth denied that Paramount's network had anything to do with the $10
billion takeover battle.  "This is a project that has been in the works for over
a year," he said.  "And we have every reason to believe that this network will
launch.  It's as sure a bet as one can have."
   But Paul Schulman, a New York-based buyer of network TV advertising spots,
said it was too early to make any judgment about Paramount's likely success.
"So far, it's only 27 percent of the United States and they are only talking
about two hours on two nights, which hardly makes them a player," Schulman said.
"And their only program is a third rendition of 'Star Trek,' for which there may
not be any room.  They have to put out a product that can do some damage."
   Schulman said that with the right programming - given "Star Trek"'s appeal,
he expects Paramount to shoot for that ever-desirable demographic of 18 to 49
year olds - "there will be enough stations for them.  There are plenty of
independent stations that got pretty jealous as they watched others go with Fox
and change from a channel number into a station with an identity and triple the
ratings."
   He said he expects Paramount to launch its network in midweek, rather than
Sunday or Monday, when competition is fierce, or on Friday or Saturday, when
viewership is low.
   Fox, with its focus on younger demographics and limited offerings - offering
neither sports nor national news, for example - will likely serve as Paramount's
role model.
   "Fox proved that you can further fragment the marketplace in terms of viewers
and ad dollars, and still make money," said Diane Mermigas, financial editor of
Electronic Media, a weekly magazine based in Chicago.  "The question is, how
many more times can the market be fragmented without doing harm to existing
players?  Some will find out, and fold."
   Aside from any programming it acquires, Paramount is likely to use the
network as an outlet for its own shows.

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posted by Robert Parson on Serial Connection BBS's local FS_TREK area:

    Details about the future of the Star Trek Franchise are squirming out.

    As for the new Star Trek: Voyager which will be rolled out Jan 1995 as
    part of the Paramount Network, Berman says the heros are chasing a
    renegade team of former Starfleet officers when both ships land in a
    sort of Bermuda Triangle of space.  They end up in an odd and unique
    astronomical phenomenon that puts both of them at the very edge of the
    galaxy.  By the end of the first show the two teams have united and
    they agree to boldly go where no one has gone before, while also
    searching for a way home.

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posted by Juan Espada on Fido STDSN echo
from the 8 November 1993 Miami Herald:

                   STAR TREK BOLDLY GOES FOR ANOTHER SPINOFF
                         by Roy Bassave, Herald staff

     When the Star Trek crew headed out into the Final Frontier back in 1966,
they encountered alien life forms and moral dilemmas. But the biggest surprise
must have been the length of a "five-year mission" that is still going strong,
two sequel series and 28 years later.
     And now there's Voyager.
     The third spinoff - following the 1987 launch of Star Trek: The Next
Generation and the 1992 arrival of Star Trek: Deep Space Nine - will hit the
airwaves in January 1995 as part of Paramount's new TV network.
     Like the two earlier sequels, Star Trek: Voyager takes place in the 24th
Century.  But this story line centers on the adventures of the U.S.S. Voyager,
one of a new class of Starfleet vessels.
     Viewers will learn about the new series in the final episode of Next
Generation, being filmed in March.  That two-hour finale will give Captain
Picard and his crew a chance to say goodbye, but it also will introduce the
concepts on which Voyager will be based.
     In the new adventure, Voyager chases a renegade team of former Starfleet
officers.  The scene is set when both ships encounter a space version of a
"Bermuda Triangle" and the two crews must unite to explore this astronomical
phenomenon while searching for a way home.
     "The gender and ethnic makeup of the captain has not been determined yet,"
says executive producer Rick Berman.  "But other crew members will include a
middle-aged Vulcan, a woman who is half human/half Klingon, a holographic
character and a Native American from a tribe that left Earth 150 years earlier
to settle on another planet."
     The new Trek replaces The Next Generation, which airs Mondays at 7 p.m. on
channels 6 and 29.  (Though 6 and 29 air all three Star Trek series, both
stations are currently committed to other networks - Channel 6 is a CBS station
and Channel 29 is part of the FOX network - and they may not have access to the
new series when Paramount launches its own channel.)
     Once the final Next Generation episode is completed next spring, the cast
will immediately begin work on its own Star Trek feature film.  While all
current cast members have signed up for the movie, Paramount has not yet signed
a director.  But sources say one candidate is Leonard Nimoy, the original Star
Trek's Mr. Spock.

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from TV Guide, 13 November 1993:

            NOW, "VOYAGER": CREWS TO CLASH ON NEW "STAR TREK" SHIP
                                by Larry Closs

   It's funny how news works.  Just two weeks ago, Paramount Communications Inc.
claimed it had few details about the upcoming series "Star Trek: Voyager" - a
key element in the company's attempt to launch a fifth network.  But on the day
Warner Bros. announced its own fifth network plans, "Trek" honcho Rick Berman
suddenly had lots to say about the new show, which debuts in January 1995.
   The concept: the two-hour pilot opens with the USS Voyager - one of a new
class of small Starfleet vessels, with a crew of 200 - chasing another ship,
which is carrying renegade vigilante Starfleeters.  The pursuit at the
Cardassian border takes the ships into a kind of Bermuda Triangle called the
Badlands, where a strange natural phenomenon transports them to an unexplored
part of the galaxy.  By the end, the crews are united on the Voyager where, lost
in space, they try to work out their differences as they explore (what else?)
strange new worlds.
   The crew: the eight or nine regulars are still uncast.  But the characters
include a commander figure (sex and race still undetermined); a half-Klingon,
half-human woman; an Asian; a holographic character; two members of two alien
species unique to this series; an older male Vulcan; a young officer who was
dishonorably discharged but asked back because he has information about the
renegades; and a Native American.  Like "Star Trek: Deep Space Nine" and "The
Next Generation," "Voyager" takes place in the 24th century and will include
characters from the current series.
   Other news: a new "Trek" movie, based on TNG, is due Thanksgiving 1994.  And,
contrary to reports, Leonard Nimoy won't direct - though he'll probably appear
with fellow original "Trek" stars William Shatner and DeForest Kelley.

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posted by Jonathan Tham on Fido STTNG echo
from a convention report dated 17 December 1993:

   [TNG episode] "Lower Decks" is supposed to be a "Star Trek: Voyager" episode.
ST:VOY characters are supposed to be introduced in this episode.  Patti Yasutake
(Nurse Alyssa Ogawa) and the female Bajoran cadet (Cadet Second Class Sito
played by Shannon Fill) that were introduced in "The First Duty" are supposed to
spin-off over to the new series.
   When privately asked, Moore and Braga denied the fact that potential ST:VOY
characters are appearing but admitted that Cadet Sito is appearing.  [?]
   ST:VOY sets are being built.  It is a full go.  Green light all the way.

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revision: 0E                               updated & compiled:  27 December 1993
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    The above articles are (c)1993 by the respective authors & publications.
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