The older I get the more I want to have quality over quantity. Older shows are so hard to watch because there is just so much filler. Half of it can be cut easily and still keep anything of importance in terms of story and character growth. I've always appreciated tight story telling and I'm happy to see it as a trend.

I'm assuming anyone wanting more watered down content watches shows all day every day and I honestly don't know how they do it. Not just in the sense that you should probably have a job and other hobbies but also in the sense that it just gets so damn boring.

Having less episodes doesn't mean that every episode needs to be expensive, but that the budget should go to making writing and direction the best it can be.

[–] smiletolerantly@awful.systems 4 points 2 days ago

Hard disagree. I'm watching Voyager for the first time right now. ~24 episodes per season, 7 seasons. You could remove a shitton of episodes from it to keep the basic plot of "Ship stranded far away. Get ship home." intact, but there are very few episodes you might be able to remove without taking something from the characters. And that's what's missing in modern series (including Trek) in my opinion; characters are either cardboard cutouts or have "arcs" that are more akin to whiplash. As a result I just don't care about these people. You also cannot really fix this with "just" better writing, because it'll still need to be rushed.

I do have a fulltime job, and hobbies, and friends that I spend time with. So I'm maybe averaging a single episode per day, and it's been and continues to be such a comfort that these characters stay with me, have time to breathe and develop, and get the space they need for the writers and actors to find their groove and make the characters something unique. I do not want to give that up again in favor of.... what? Getting fancy visuals and being done with a show after a week?

I'm permanently done with Marvel/StarWars/NewTrek. Next up are rewatches of DS9 and Next Generation.