We will never see the beloved Janeway Maneuver in full HD glory.


Speaking to Trek News in an incredibly lengthy interview, Burnett detailed the reasons why fully HD versions of Deep Space Nine and Voyager would be Herculean tasks for CBS and Paramount to release. Basically, until recently, TV was shot on 35mm film, which is already high resolution—too high resolution for the early days of television. The film footage was edited together, archived, and then shrunk down to the more manageable NTSC video resolution for broadcast. As such, the Blu-ray release for the older Trek series could use the original negative to create a full HD release relatively easily, as each episode’s film was already edited together.





Unfortunately, it wasn’t actually worth it. Sales of the extravagant TNG remaster —original retail price $118 for just season one—failed to reach CBS and Paramount’s expectations.

A similar process would have to be done for both DS9 and Voyager—and would actually be even harder. Both shows extensively used CGI effects that were only ever rendered in the lower videotape resolution, which means all the shows’ special effects would need to be completely recreated. But neither show is anywhere near as popular in the public consciousness as TNG, it’s simply too much effort for not enough of a value proposition.


So, a long story made short and depressing: Deep Space Nine and Voyager aren’t popular enough to be worth the incredible effort it would take to make them available in a high-def format. It’s not an impossible task—just an unprecedented and incredible challenging one. Who knows, maybe one day it will happen. But for now, you’ll only ever see DS9 and Voyager in sub-HD resolutions.

Burnett’s full interview covers all this—the painstaking work done for TNG’s Blu-ray releases, and the future of behind-the-scenes featurettes on Star Trek releases—and is absolutely worth the read, even if it’s a bit of a downer. Check it out at the link below.


[Trek News]