Back in the 90s we had shows like Babylon 5 and Star Trek. Nowadays we don’t have a TV show that involves space travel. What happened? Did people lose interest? Do people consider shows like that too intellectual? Too nerdy? Will this genre go the way of the Western?
I don’t think so…it’s not currently in production, but have you seen the recent Battlestar Galactica (not the 70s version)? I think the new Star Wars movies being done will also re-boot interest in this genre.
A “new” poster joins a college website to post a question about the absence of tv shows on space travel. Beam me up, Scottie.
TV shows go through waves of popular topics. There are two shows on deadly plagues on scifi now, for example, and you could count Walking Dead as another plague show. Vampires and other supernatural creatures were big a few years ago, but seem to have peaked. Space travel will come back.
I just think those shows moved to the cable networks. I binged watched Battlestar Galactica http://www.imdb.com/title/tt0407362/ (newer one) and Continuum http://www.imdb.com/title/tt1954347/ with my son. There’s another spin-off from Battlestar too. Continuum is Sci-Fi, not space travel, but it had the same feel.
We watched a bit of Continuum, but it just wasn’t that good. We are long overdue for a good sci-fi snow. Battlestar Gallactica and Stargate: Atlantis (which wasn’t even that good) were six years ago. Firefly was 12 years ago. Stargate Universe which might have become a good show was cancelled four years ago.
We’re getting our fix from Marvel, but it’s not the same.
We just re-watch Stargate SG-1 on DVD 
I just started the original Star Trek series again, on Netflix. By the time I work my way through TNG, DS9, STV, and STE, I may have enough space travel for a while. (I already watched ST:TAS, for the true completest.)
I do think popular tv shows reflect the times, in the way that westerns reflected American culture in the 60s. But with the explosion of channels and viewing options, I’m not sure that the “big 3 networks” are the place to look for trends. Maybe it’s just our skewed interests, but my TiVo seems to have an abundance of tech-heavy spy type shows (often featuring one or more characters with “special” abilities), and they’re increasingly dark.
In 20 years, someone will be saying the same thing about Downton Abbey.
X-Files is one of my favorite shows of all time!
I agree they should have extended Fireflys run.
I also want them to bring back LA Law.
And Cop Rock.
I don’t think anybody could accuse Babylon 5 or Star Trek of being “too intellectual”…
I just watched all of Firefly, and I have to say that it just didn’t grab me all that much. I don’t get all the love for it. I haven’t watched Serenity yet, though.