https://twitter.com/startrekcbs/status/1084865725934850048

I don’t consider offering up a plan that holds you hostage to commercials the actual plan. Now they can charge you more for the “commercial free” tier to make it seem like you’re getting a bargain.

I’ve watched a bit of Discovery (just started it actually as Trek came up in the thread for The Last Jedi) but didn’t finish yet. So I can’t say whether it gets better but basing off reviews it doesn’t seem like I’ll like it any more by the end is what I meant. What I’ve seen hasn’t been doing much for me. I’ll go back to it eventually, but I’m not a huge fan of the direction it seems to be taking and the season two trailer looks like more of the same. The spin-off I don’t care about because I don’t like that character from what I’ve seen of her.

Space opera has, historically, struggled on network television. The original,Star Trek struggled on NBC for three seasons before finally getting the axe. Battlestar Galactica ran one season, Firefly got canned halfway through its first season.

Voyager managed seven years on UPN, but that was an upstart network and Trek was its only draw. Enterprise was cancelled after four years on UPN, and the network ultimately folded and merged with WB’s upstart network.

Space opera seemed to really on work on first run syndication in the 80s and 90s with TNG, DS9, B5 (and even that was cancelled and rescued by TNT), and Andromeda.

The streaming services would seem to provide the same kind of home for these types of programs that syndication did for TNG in the 80s.

I think Discovery’s production costs were covered by selling the international streaming rights to Netflix, so that’s how CBS is funding it.

But, yes, they’re absolutely using it as a draw to lure people to their stream8ng service. It has a built in audience that will pay to watch a new Star Trek (or Big Brother) series, that probably wouldn’t take the plunge to watch new properties like Strange Angel.