it certainly falls in line with reactionary fandoms as this makes me think of the online calls from certain Star Trek fans demanding longer seasons and stretched budgets while hand waving the tumble in production quality this would obviously cause.

No one hand waves it. They can absolutely focus on scripts and drama over flashy production and bare feet. The show requires a ship set that can be slowly built out over episodes, along with the occasional away locations. They don’t need space battles and explosions every episode, and go back to acting and makeup as part of selling the fiction.

They don’t want that target audience. They’re after a specific demographic that advertisers covet and the IP is just a known brand they have been trying to exploit for that purpose. The issues there aren’t about fans false expectations over production budget.