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Best Genre TV Series Executive Producer?


SpaceChampion

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Watching some of the Expanse aftershow interviews and thinking, who is the best genre tv exec producer, and how does Naren Shankar rank?  From an adaptation standpoint, is The Expanse the best? 

Let's discuss in two different categories:
1.  Story-side:  pacing, themes, consistency, continuity, coherency, focus.

2. Production-side:  casting, good use of budget....  (whatever else falls in this category.

 

I'd think J. Michael Straczynksi must be highly ranked as well, but B5 was 30 years ago.  Still, I think on story-side issues, JMS would be better.

 

Ron Moore of course, does a lot of things well, but his failure to stick the landing with BSG will always leave a sour note.  Same with Lost and Lindelof / Cuse.

 

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Erik Kripke has to have a shout, right? The first five seasons of Supernatural plus The Boys, and a couple of less-seen but seemingly decently-reviewed shows in between.

 


Also we might think he's a complete boob now but Joss Whedon has to be in there for pure quality terms. 


If the Alien show he is producing turns out well, Noah Hawley might be in with a shout. Mind you, I didn't finish Legion even though I thought the first season was ace, maybe I should do that.


Of course the real answer is Bryan Fuller but the networks aren't ready for that conversation.

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There are reasonable choices:

  • J. Michael StraczynskiBabylon 5 and his animation work was all excellent, Crusade and Jeremiah flawed but both were heavily interfered with by the studio, and Sense8 was also excellent, and the rushed finale was done without his involvement. Babylon 5 II will be a big test of what he can do going solo again.
  • Ronald D. Moore's work on Star Trek: The Next Generation and Deep Space Nine was superb, Outlander is great (if you like that kind of thing) and For All Mankind is spectacular. Most of Battlestar Galactica is good to great, with only some poor choices in the last two seasons letting it down.
  • Naren Shankar's work on The Expanse is impressive, and his earlier work on Star Trek and The Outer Limits was solid. His procedural work was mostly unremarkable, though, and Almost Human was so-so. He does also work on For All Mankind as well. I think I'd rather still give Moore the nod over Shankar, though Shankar can be very good.
  • Damon Lindelof did great work on Lost, and was unusually able to find the thread of quality after losing it (arguably more than once), which is rare in TV. The finale is problematic but I would argue nowhere near as logically compromised as BSG's. His subsequent film work was mostly dogshit, but very few writers have pulled off a career renaissance as genuinely impressive as The Leftovers. The possibly even superior Watchmen then solidified that reputation. What he does next in television will be interesting to watch.
  • Dave Filoni's body of work is exceptional: early work on King of the Hill and then a main creative force on the first season of Avatar: The Last Airbender. Then he became the main creative force on Star Wars: The Clone WarsRebels and Resistance, and the joint-creative-lead on The MandalorianThe Book of Boba Fett, Ahsoka etc. Arguably he's not really had a dud apart from the Clone Wars movie (which he never wanted realised as a film, apparently) and Resistance, which was the project he had the least direct involvement in, allegedly. He probably needs to show some more of his chops outside the Star Wars universe, but he certainly seems to be the writer-producer who best understands the Star Wars canon and how to make stuff in it that's both entertaining and fanboy-pleasing (although the Void Between Worlds does feel like it teasing the shark, ready for the jump, even if it's not revving the bike yet).
  • Noah Hawley has done outrageously good work on Fargo and Legion, but I think his credentials really rest on how good Alien turns out to be.
  • Russell T. Davies did great work resurrecting Doctor Who, though his actual scripting was spotty up until his last season, when it suddenly caught fire and he turned in a slew of great episodes. His non-Who SFF work is impressive: Dark Season (which marked the acting debut of Kate Winslet, many years pre-Titanic), The Second Coming (about Jesus emerging in contemporary Manchester), the third season of Torchwood and recent dystopian drama Years and Years.

Joss Whedon will probably never work on a high-profile TV show (genre or not) ever again, so that's a moot point for now.

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Some others to consider:

* 12 Monkeys was spectacular, so credit has to go to series creator Travis Fickett and Terry Matalas.  Are their work on MacGyver or Nikita as good?  The latter worked on ST Picard too, as well as Nightflyers.

* John Fawcett (Orphan Black, Lost Girl, Titans), and Graeme Manson (Orphan Black, Snowpiercer)

* Rockne S. O'Bannon (Farscape, Defiance, seaQuest DSV, Alien Nation)

 

 

 

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It's really quite impossible to really rank people, but in terms of pure artistic vision + diversity of creation + production executive talent purely within genre work, I'd say it's hard to argue that Bryan Fuller and Damon Lindelof aren't near the pinnacle in the genre, followed by Ronald D. Moore. Whedon and Straczynski within their particular wheelhouses are also proven showrunners, creating engaging cult classics while also being able to bring them in on time and under budget (which is not something one can always say about Fuller).

The best writer of the bunch listed is either Fuller or Davies (if you consider his non-genre work like Queer as Folk and It's a Sin in the mix), with Lindelof in the mix. I'd also add Charlie Brooker, whose "San Junipero" is one of my favorite hours of television ever, and Whedon as well for works like "The Body", but Whedon has a very strong and particular voice and is less of a chameleon than some of the other writers.

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If The Plot Against America counts David Simon into conversation, I would include him. Likewise Richard Price with The Outsider. I think the genre works are the weakest of the shows they've made but the rest of their credentials are exemplary.

Otherwise, I would say David Lindelof and Ronald Moore. David Benioff and Dan Weiss may enter the conversation if they pull off The Three Body Problem.

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On 12/28/2021 at 8:15 PM, Ran said:

It's really quite impossible to really rank people, but in terms of pure artistic vision + diversity of creation + production executive talent purely within genre work, I'd say it's hard to argue that Bryan Fuller and Damon Lindelof aren't near the pinnacle in the genre, followed by Ronald D. Moore. Whedon and Straczynski within their particular wheelhouses are also proven showrunners, creating engaging cult classics while also being able to bring them in on time and under budget (which is not something one can always say about Fuller).

The best writer of the bunch listed is either Fuller or Davies (if you consider his non-genre work like Queer as Folk and It's a Sin in the mix), with Lindelof in the mix. I'd also add Charlie Brooker, whose "San Junipero" is one of my favorite hours of television ever, and Whedon as well for works like "The Body", but Whedon has a very strong and particular voice and is less of a chameleon than some of the other writers.

That's a very good list. But, as I don't think a showrunner/writer/director needs to be a chameleon (it's great if they can be, but isn't a requisite for greatness), I would add Mike Flanagan, with his very specific and unique vision and aesthetic. I've loved eerything he has done, especially on TV - it's a series of modern horror masteepieces.

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3 hours ago, Trebla said:

I'd say Michael Schur.

For SFF genre television, not so far because he only has the one entry (The Good Place).

For television overall, yes, he must be one of the most powerful figures in Hollywood television. As a writer on The Office and then the co-creator of Parks and RecreationBrooklyn Nine-Nine (though he had bugger all to do with it after the first two episodes), The Good Place and Rutherford Falls, he has a formidable creative and commercial hit rate.

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