If
the business model referred to in the question was meant to lead to
“programming aimed at a broad audience”,
having the appeal of “being family-friendly”, while causing the
audience to be “watching through those all-important commercials
that were paying the network's bills” , then it seems to have
worked for the first Star Trek series, at least for a relatively
short period of time. The series was reworked in that the original
pilot was replaced by a second one that was deemed to be more
audience-friendly, and less “cerebral”. (1)
This
model may have been more conducive to audience appreciation, at least
in the minds of network television executives, but it also limited
the range of the narrative of the stories told, perhaps removing some
of the empathy that could be directed by the viewer towards the
characters. Incidentally, through doing some internet research, I
discovered that the original pilot was inserted into the script of
the 11th and 12th episodes (The Menagerie). In
this two-part episode, the characters were re-connected and some of
the cerebral and empathetic elements were re-introduced.
(1) For
quoted references, as well as most other references to the series'
early history in this paragraph, see the video Star
Trek and the Business of Network Television – likely available
only to participants of this course.
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