I don't know why you'd say that. Apollo, the space shuttle, Star Wars, Planet of the Apes and 2001 showed a great interest by the public in sci fi. "TV audiences" weren't a different population.In late 60's , there really wasn't much of tv audience for serious Science fiction shows. Television from 70's to the about 1987 was a pretty barren place for science fiction. Star Trek The Next Generation helped change that.
I don't know why you'd say that. Apollo, the space shuttle, Star Wars, Planet of the Apes and 2001 showed a great interest by the public in sci fi. "TV audiences" weren't a different population.
TNG came out after two Star Trek television series and 4 feature films. It was almost guaranteed to be well received.
Those aren't necessarily a problem with a lack of audience, but a lack of audiences with low standards. A "serious" show has to actually be serious, which means reasonable effects, good acting, fascinating plots and thoughtful themes. That requires dedication on the part of a network for the upfront costs and market research to understand what your audience wants, rather than just going with more monsters when ratings go down.With some notable exceptions few if any tv series enjoyed success on network television in that time. The cost of producing them was an issue as was the lack of a television audience. Also lack of quality writing didn't help.
as has been mentioned - it was optimistic, fully integrated, discussed complicated concepts in an easy to understand manner, the good guys had morals and rules (but were not wedded to rules)
Space Patrol went 1110 episodes. The Outer Limits went 9 seasons. Twilight Zone 5. Doctor Who - ongoing.Most of the series that were launched prior to the time of the Next Generation lasted for maybe a season at best .
Space Patrol went 1110 episodes. The Outer Limits went 9 seasons.
Post TNG, many shows had longer runs. SG-1 10 seasons. X-Files for 9 seasons. Star Trek shows in total have 700 some episodes, but the longest series on its own was TNG with 178 episodes and 7 seasons.
Which doesn't really comment on the lack of audiences in the '60s, '70s and '80s. The problem was the cost of producing a show that met the standards set by big budget films and keeping a story interesting season after season. I don't think TNG broke any new ground, it just had enough fan backing and budget to present something that Star Trek fans wouldn't quickly tire of. Computer based effects had also improved to the point of making fresh sequences much less expensive than when everything had to be done with film and models.Babylon 5 ran 5 years and 110 episodes.
Which doesn't really comment on the lack of audiences in the '60s, '70s and '80s. The problem was the cost of producing a show that met the standards set by big budget films and keeping a story interesting season after season. I don't think TNG broke any new ground, it just had enough fan backing and budget to present something that Star Trek fans wouldn't quickly tire of. Computer based effects had also improved to the point of making fresh sequences much less expensive than when everything had to be done with film and models.
Until 20 years of Trekkie fever crashed into effects improvements, the bar was simply too high to produce an acceptable series in the post 2001 world.