Brandon, question.... what if original DS had been able to spend a bit more and do retakes, to eliminate bloopers and things such as wobbly tombstones...as of course they wished they could do, at the time.... would DS have lost "charm" to you, and would it have been of less interest to you? Not trying to be a smartass, just wondering.
No, it wouldn't lose it's original charm, but this is what gives it part of its charm. I'm not sure if anyone was around when I first burst onto the online DS scene, but I was very defensive about people laughing and poking fun at the mishaps and bloopers that occured in DS. I couldn't believe that people were taking this wonderful program and completely shredding it to pieces by making fun of the actors mess ups. Soon I came to realize that it was part of DS, that it is what drives the fans to be so passionite about it. It reminds us of a time when things were simple, when they could be laughed at (well, except for all that war and rights and liberation stuff etc). DS provided an escape from real life, all that stuff listed previously in the parenthesis. This is what made DS what it was. Of course you have the occasional good story telling and the wonderful actors, that's a given.
As far as the rest of your post about retelling the same old story, or remaking DS--I agree with you as far as what you said about not using the original characters as a "crutch" to carry the show. This may or may not grab the original viewers, and probably would confuse the newer viewers if it weren't explained in a good way, because the new people wouldn't get these characters because they didn't see the original series.
As I talked about in another post, I've been working on a DS Pilot script for my own amusement, and David is master of Collinwood. Roger is VERY OLD, and a number of characters are dead, and some I haven't decided what to do with yet, in terms of the story. I have Barnabas (in my plan, though not yet in the script because I haven't gotten past the first act) involved, but by no means does he carry the show like the character did originally and in subsequent remakes. He does have a very interesting storyline, IMO, which involves a mysterious new relative that happens to be Barnabas' son. Introducing this new character has allowed me to plan to not involve Barnabas too heavily, but to keep him on deck should he be needed, and this also eliminates the need to completely write him out of the show.
I think perhaps the biggest problem with doing a new DS is alienation. The original viewers are a big audience, though not that large when considered with the masses that this new version would have to reach in order to stay afloat. Still, they are not small enough to be ignored. The outcry against the show should it take a wrong step would be enormous, as we have seen with other issues that have popped up here recently. With this pressure, as well as considering a new audience and how to draw them in without making them go "WTF is up with this show?" is a daunting thing. Sure, some may say that a writer shouldn't worry about the audience, either new or old, because they you just open yourself up to catering to the audience and what they want. But this is something that can't be ignored because if you kill a major character you might upset people. Here I fear I'm not getting my point across well enough. My point is that you can't take an audience's wants from a show into consideration, but you can't ignore them either, at least not with this particular audience. To snub all the original fans would be like saying "Yea, we know you watched when it was on in the 60s, but that's too bad because if you don't like this one then don't watch it and screw you." And that is something that would not be good.
In all honesty, you can't try to cater to them because you're going to end up offending someone anyway. The way to go about a new DS IMO is to age the younger characters from the show--like David, Amy, Hallie, etc, because you don't know what their personalities would be like when they are 40. You can make assumptions, yes, but you don't know. Not only that but it also provides many years to have passed that you can explain backstory with, and open up interesting plot points. Some of the original older characters--Roger, Liz, Maggie, Quentin, Barnabas, Julia, etc will have aged or even died, but they could also be changed by what has happened in the years since we last saw them, though they can't be changed as much as the original children were.
Basically I'm just prattling on here about something that I can't seem to find my way through the fog to. Hopefully you all will see my point and get what I'm trying to say. Basically it is this:
No matter what you do, people will be critical of you. In recreating DS there is no way to capture the allure of the original for the old fans, so you have to create something new and risk alienating some of them in order to gain a newer, younger, bigger audience. And you can't have too much confusing backstory based on the original becaues then the new viewers won't be able to pick up what you are talking about. Like you couldn't have Barnabas and Julia in the opening scene talking about their trip to PT in 1970 and all their time travels, throwing in random nods to the previous series, because the new viewers would just not get it.
So, there is definitely a challenge here. Maybe when I get my "fun" pilot (lol) finished, I'll post it somewhere so you guys can judge what you think. Hell, maybe I'll just put the teaser up somewhere if anyone is interested. Just let me know in a PM and I could send it to you.
