Big problem is that the Sopranos and the quality long form drama that followed have highlighted how weak and formulaic most episodic TV and hollywood movies are. Right now I'd find it very difficult to watch an adventure of the week TV show, however a huge chunk of a possible trek audience would want exactly that. So pretty much there are 4 types of choices:
Long form snails pace quality - HBO does trek, great for the tiny audience that would watch. This is what I'd like and couldn't care less about the setting if it was done well.
Abrams big bangs - too expensive to do well on TV and not Trek, there are lots of superhero cartoons for people that want that stuff and a new Star Wars one coming later this year.
STNG, DS9, Voyager style show - more of the same and that was getting old 10+ years ago. After BSG do people really want to go back to child and casual viewer friendly adventure of the week?
Old school TOS scifi stories - fine but I can't help but notice that shows like the Twilight Zone don't get made any more and are there the Bixby level writers to do it?
Enterprise jumped between one type and another and they couldn't figure out a balance in time, lack of interesting characters and that damned song didn't help.
I have no idea how you make a show that is enjoyable to people that watch CSI and those that prefer soviet art films to superhero reboots, without going the HBO route and losing casual viewers.
Big problem is that the Sopranos and the quality long form drama that followed have highlighted how weak and formulaic most episodic TV and hollywood movies are. Right now I'd find it very difficult to watch an adventure of the week TV show, however a huge chunk of a possible trek audience would want exactly that. So pretty much there are 4 types of choices:
Long form snails pace quality - HBO does trek, great for the tiny audience that would watch. This is what I'd like and couldn't care less about the setting if it was done well.
Abrams big bangs - too expensive to do well on TV and not Trek, there are lots of superhero cartoons for people that want that stuff and a new Star Wars one coming later this year.
STNG, DS9, Voyager style show - more of the same and that was getting old 10+ years ago. After BSG do people really want to go back to child and casual viewer friendly adventure of the week?
Old school TOS scifi stories - fine but I can't help but notice that shows like the Twilight Zone don't get made any more and are there the Bixby level writers to do it?
Enterprise jumped between one type and another and they couldn't figure out a balance in time, lack of interesting characters and that damned song didn't help.
I have no idea how you make a show that is enjoyable to people that watch CSI and those that prefer soviet art films to superhero reboots, without going the HBO route and losing casual viewers.
I had in mind for my post something formatted similarly to DS9 or Stargate SG-1: good myth arc with season-long sub-arcs, but episodic enough that you can miss an episode and still be able to follow it (and SG-1 usually stuck a "previously on" in the continuity-heavy episodes anyway). And given it's set in a scenario where the Federation is basically on its last legs militarily (it starts with the enemy capturing Earth, for Pete's sake), it'd definitely be more like nBSG or late DS9 in tone than like the other series.
"Great War! / And I cannot take more! / Great tour! / I keep on marching on / I play the great score / There will be no encore / Great War! / The War to End All Wars"
— Sabaton, "Great War"
I found the standalone episode of the TNG-Voy becoming simultaneously entertaining and dissatisfying, like they'd figured out how to do entertaining episodes and could crank them out at will, I can't see myself wanting to go from Breaking Bad to a version of Trek they've done before. Its also pretty inconceivable that the TV execs would consider something not family friendly, and it seems kind of unfair on any younger viewers for grumpy old Wire fans to get a show that only 20% of an audience might want. I'm guessing lots of people here are Walking Dead/Game of Thrones/True Blood viewers, would that group really want a kid friendly show?
Is there a canonical future in the mythos? In Enterprise and Voyager the future for the Fed looked pretty good with those temporal ships
The first, I'm really not seeing it happen, because "it's been done before". It could be a Federation ship in another galaxy, but that is so Voyager+Stargate that it doesn't even make sense. Anything in the Alfa and Beta quadrants is also old news.
The sencond would be a "Red Squad" story like. I very much like the idea of a ship of cadets being cut out from the Federation. It allows for great character development, the shaping of Starfleet officers as they struggle to raise to the standard we came to expect, conditioned by their particular situation, their morals and principles always hanging in the balance with each decision. This story would allow for the old exploration "thing" behind enemy lines, trying to find new tech, intel and hitting the enemy covertly wherever possible.
That's why the BSG reboot was so bad. With all the extreme close ups, and the artsy fartsy camera work, They got so far away from the premises of what made the original, so great.
We'll have to agree to disagree. I watched the reimagined BSG end-to-end after a month long Star Trek binge, and I can honestly say it was easily one of the best Sci-Fi shows i've seen in recent years.
As for a new Trek show; I honestly think i'd set it around the time that we play STO in. We've got political upheavals, planetary-wide disasters. The barabarians (figuratively and literally) are at the gates.
I imagine places like Earth are not the Utopia's once seen in the show. With the threat of war with the Klingons, the Undine inflitrations, the Borg incursions and now the Dyson Spheres, I dare say Earth and other Fed worlds are pretty paranoid right now.
You're just a machine. And machines can be broken.
Season one:
Small Federation patrol ship from the movie Era. (reuses Miranda models.)
This is not one of the glory ships like Enterprise or Excelsior. This is the ship that goes out to do the less glamourous jobs. Older captain just looking to put in his time till he can retire with all his pieces intact.
His last mission ended he has to do one more tour to go home to the quiet he ran from and now misses.
With the ship having finished a tour you get to see a handful of grizzled officers leaving this beat up ship as new officers are assigned to the billet.
An ancestor of Soong is assigned as a science officer. (NOT Brent Spiner. Use Spiner as his/her father for the send off. Recommend making the character female so no one expects her to look too much like Spiner.)
Use an almost all human crew. (Keep costume costs to a minimum.)
Use virtual unknowns for main cast for budget and availability.
Ship is sent to patrol the new open zone as the Khitomer accords have just changed the face of politics. Deal with the Syndicate and rogue Klingons that are violently unhappy with the new peace.
Not all new cast arrive in the pilot. Slot for replacements after a few episodes. Several months between starbases and unlike ships like Enterprise they can't just stop their patrol to take refugees to new homes on a whim. Use this to add a fish out of water character to explore how the Federation and star fleet does things. Recommend an orion smuggler. Used to getting things done by how is easiest this time. Not by some book. Has some sense of justice and right and wrong. (Not a slaver or drug runner. But bootleg entertainment and romulan ale can be profitable.) If the character proves popular to the fans. Keep him/her. If not they depart when they final reach the next station.
No more than three times in the season. Have Excelsior arrive and end a fight that would be tough for our little ship just by arriving. Show Sulu's replacement getting accolades just for showing up while our protagonists are sent back to work.
Season Two:
With the cast selected based on viewer popularity. Show the threads that had been barely seen in the first season to be the manipulation of the Tal Shiar. Our protagonists shift from their patrol to neutral worlds near the Romulan border as they work to uncover the plot by their crafty neighbors.
Season Three:
Last year of the patrol. With the links obvious to our protagonists they have a choice. Go behind the lines in Romulan space and find the final secrets. Or obey orders and let the politicians handle the situation. (yeah right)
The ever shifting issues in the romulan sphere make the actions of our protagonists force them to turn their attentions inward. The end of the season has them close their borders as they deal with the internal strife from their own actions.
Our protagonists finally return to the Utopia Planitia yards.
The ship to be refitted or scrapped. The crew reassigned or given a new mission.
All that would depend on if the producers green light a fourth season or not. .
Originally Posted by pwlaughingtrendy
Network engineers are not ship designers.
Nor should they be. Their ships would look weird.
I'd expect most production companies to be turned off by a show that doesn't focus on the Federation. I know that we all like the Klingons and Romulans but ostensibly, they've never been the main "characters" of any Star Trek series.
You're just a machine. And machines can be broken.
I'd expect most production companies to be turned off by a show that doesn't focus on the Federation. I know that we all like the Klingons and Romulans but ostensibly, they've never been the main "characters" of any Star Trek series.
I can't help but wonder if that wouldn't be more of a draw than a put-off. Battlestar Galactica wasn't about hot nymphomaniacs trying to destroy humanity the first time around either, see.
I can't help but wonder if that wouldn't be more of a draw than a put-off. Battlestar Galactica wasn't about hot nymphomaniacs trying to destroy humanity the first time around either, see.
It's possible. But I doubt we'd be able to use the sex appeal of Klingons to our advantage.
It depends how we're talking really. If this is a "if you could do it with no restraints" kind of question then sure, why not. If we're talking at least semi-realistically then i'm afraid it'd get passed over for something that's more Fed-centric.
You're just a machine. And machines can be broken.
Actually, there is no threat. The Federation supposedly, IS at war with the Empire. Along with every other faction in the game. And there's a surplus of resources, despite all these protracted, wars.
Yeah, but if you look at what you end up doing at max level, the declaration of war is practically irrelevant. The Federation and the Klingons are working together on just about everything.
In fact, the standoff in the new FE is probably the closest you get to the threat of a full-scale conflict (from an in-story point of view) for a long time.
You're just a machine. And machines can be broken.
A show about a Wells Class timeship from the 29th century, travelling through time to ensure the timeline goes as it should. There would be a mix of stuff including exploration (involving timeline threatening anomalies and stuff), combat with bad guys trying to change the timeline and stuff, and of course, time traveling would let the crew of the ship visit various times that we know from the existing series.
Winning.
It's what I do. It's what I just did. It's what I'm about to do again. It's being undisputed emperor of an empire that cannot be disproved as the most powerful intergalactic empire in the entire universe; I always win, and everything I've won will definitely be won again... by me. It's my signature move, and thus, it's my signature. Problem, Sonic? Yeah, I mean you, Sonic, because you're being beat up, despite your being super. You can't even hit Shadow back, can you? Nope, he's too strong for you. Of course, I'm not Shadow, I'm the Super Emerald fueled fox that's pulling the strings; trust me, the fight would only be a few frames long if I were in it personally. Oh, and here's something for all you guys thinking you can win Last Post Wins 3.0; trust me, I'll be around a long while after the sun has already consumed the Earth while I sit out with the forum servers on Titan. Yes, I mean Titan... that comparatively little moon orbiting Saturn. It's a nice little place in a version of our solar system where the sun is a lot bigger. I mean, Mars will last longer than your precious Earth, but by then, it'll be one hot planet... and I figure Saturn's moon will be about the right temperate for a super-powered warlord. Oh, and trust me, I packed a lot of rings, and I mean a lot. Trillions, in fact, so I'll never run out of rings to power my super form. Besides, if I start to run out, I can just chaos control more rings into my reach. It's quite easy, really. You should try it. Granted, you'll never have the 7 Super Emeralds that I have in my possession, nor the Master Emerald that I've got hidden away somewhere... absorbed into my body thanks to Sonic logic, but whatever. I win. Again. I'm not kidding, either. Just check Last Post Wins, and if the last post isn't mine, it soon will be. Very, very soon. You can count on it. Seriously. By the way, if you're wondering, there's a really great Super Tails sprite sheet out there... somewhere... by some guy named shadow_91. These sprites are really great. Like, really good. Quality. Just like what I like to see in a sprite sheet. Also, credit to Joe T.E., his Sonic Battle style Super Sonic sprites have a great palette for a Super Sonic being beat up by Super Shadow, who's palette is from a Super Shadow sheet of unknown origin, but it turns out they were "borrowed" from a better sheet made by a certain Domenico. Oh, and the gif is actually a custom made super version of a similar gif, of which there are only 3 or 4 copies to be found by Google, and even then, evidently of an unknown source. Yep, it's one of those things. Stuff people have made, spread around, only for it to vanish and you to be the only person who still has a copy, not even knowing where it came from... like, literally at all. Oh, and anyone notice that Shadow's little chaos snap blast thingies are red and blue now? Yeah, I changed it. Problem, fans of purple? Yeah, I know you got a problem with that one, but you can just deal with it. After all, according to all known laws of aviation, there is no way a bee should be able to fly... alright, alright, I'll spare you the entire Bee Movie script, just Google it if you want. By the way, ever wonder how your characters would've ended up if they evolved in another universe? Yeah, that. Think about it. Ok, so you probably didn't bother reading up to here, but whatever, here's a surprise for you guys over at ESD (RP) who were crazy enough to read this: Emperor Nat of the mcfreakin' Terran Empire is gonna be right all along! The universe is gonna go BOOM! *Thumbs up to the insanity*
Oh, now don't tell me you want in on all this! Well, ok. Look this that Egg Pawn hanging outside your window, pointing his laser rifle at you, waiting for my next order. He's doing his part. He helps conquer the weak-minded. He roboticizes the weak-bodied. Heck, he even helps keep the useless people from causing any trouble, but you know what? Join. Find the closest Nataran Empire roboticization center near you and join the ranks, before the ranks find you. Oh, I know, you figure it must be so satisfying to know I basically rule the world now, and you know what? It is, but do you want to know the true definition of satisfaction? Well, let me tell you a little story. One day, you see a brand new event. They're giving out boxes that give old event stuff. Your dilithium is plentiful. You buy a whole lot of Phoenix packs on your main, and open them all. You get one epic token. Then, you decide, that since you have all the Breen ships and don't give a damn about the others, you exchange it for an ultra rare, and grab yourself a Jem'Hadar Attack Ship and for the hell of it, a Voth Bulwark. You open both, leaving the Bulwark in your vast masses of starships as you jump into the bugship and deck it out, deck by deck, into the most awesome Jem'Hadar ship you can. You fly it. You enjoy it. Eventually, you get bored and leave, leaving the old Bulwark never flown... until later. Your main is long complete. Your new alt main, based off some character you pulled out of nothing just to explain away some starship being in service without the command of your dear admiral, is also complete. Mostly. Their reps and doffs are hard at work, getting you stuff. You realize the potential, and head back for your dear admiral, pull the most Voth themed build you can out of thin air, and suit up in your giant ship in the shape of you know what. You head out... and cause all sorts of havoc. Enemies scream out your name as their very life is drained away by your swarms of Aceton Assimilators. They complain to the devs of your OPness when you revive yourself from death every time you die. Do you show any form of mercy? No. After all, this isn't the United Federation of Planets, this is mother frakkin' Starfleet, where you explore strange new worlds and kick butt never kicked before. Oh, and you realize that I just wrote another speech rivaling your own signature. Cool. Oh, wait, that's just the original draft, it is part of my signature now. Oh, and yes, I am aware that I have become a Canadian Regent; one day, sooner than you'd expect, we'll suddenly decide to take over the world and declare an "alliance", and I shall become it's Regent. You know, like the Klingon-Cardassian Alliance in the mirror universe of our beloved Star Trek. Oh, who'll we be taking over with? I dunno, maybe [REDACTED], or maybe aliens from outer space. Guess you'll have to wait and find out, won't we? Until then, don't ask too many questions, or else my Breen allies on Titania might pick up on your -- [REDACTED BY BREEN CONFEDERACY FOR REASONS] Also, psst... keep an eye out for flying Tribbles! Also walls. Big, great walls, separating entire continents apart. Walls patrolled by Tribbles. Flying Tribbles. Flying Nukara Tribbles. Don't worry, it's not like they were on Venus with a herd of Tholians or anything, they just like the extreme heat and brutal weather like acid rain and hurricane force winds as the norm. Oh, and definitely keep your eye out on any two-tailed foxes, because if they ain't glowing, they're definitely an imposter. Possibly an Undine, we caught one of those once in my place once. Oh, and if you find a two-tailed fox that doesn't like the cold... most certainly ask him to say sorry. If he refuses, DESTROY HIM WITH A DOOMSDAY MACHINE, BECAUSE THERE'S NOTHING ELSE THAT WOULD BE ENOUGH AGAINST SUCH AN OVERPOWERED IMPOSTER!
tr;dr, I am winning last post wins 3.0. Thank you for your time.
A show about a Wells Class timeship from the 29th century, travelling through time to ensure the timeline goes as it should. There would be a mix of stuff including exploration (involving timeline threatening anomalies and stuff), combat with bad guys trying to change the timeline and stuff, and of course, time traveling would let the crew of the ship visit various times that we know from the existing series.
In the meantime, how about a fanfic?
(See link below.)
[SIGPIC][/SIGPIC]
"Star Trek: Rubicon" Season 1, Season 2 A new era, a new time, a new crew, a new ship, a new mission...
"I rather believe that time is a companion who goes with us on the journey and reminds us to cherish every moment because it will never come again."- Jean-Luc Picard
Decent funding, but not big-budget, thirty-nine with a possible back thirty-nine meaning you have to plan for seventy-eight but be able to wrap it up before forty. Odds are good they'd give a fourth season either way because networks care almost as much about hitting fifty episodes to prove the idea did well as they do about it actually doing well, so you can probably anticipate fifty-two episodes, but that's not set in stone. Abramstrek alienates more people than it draws in, and fans of Abramstrek won't likely immediately distrust proper Star Trek, so continuing Abramsverse in a series is as unwise for a studio as it is for me as a writer. So we go Primary Timeline; but we have a lot of continuity from some quasi-canonical sources like STO we don't wanna mess around with; some communities are heavily invested in that content, and damned if we don't have a bunch of people we need to use one day doing cameo appearances there. So we don't interfere too heavily with that either. Defiance didn't do well enough to justify copying their model, so we also don't want to run concurrent to STO. We either need to do something pre-2409 but post-2375 or we need to try and jump post 2409, honestly probably the easier thing to do since we aren't trying to sandwich in an entirely new chapter into existing continuity - Enterprise kind of proved the risks inherent in that.
So, my pitch?
Cast, Staff, Budgetary Concerns and Expenditures
First comes snagging some SF writers with talent. Braga's work was usually amazing on previous Trek installments, and though we've gone a few years without a decent space odyssy, there's still plenty of talent in that pool. I'd love to see how Robert Hewitt Wolfe worked withing the framework I'm about to set out, particularly after seeing the original plans for Andromeda. Hell, maybe snag a Stargate writer or two? Their attempt at space odyssey was atrocious IMO, but they did 'military explorers' fantastic for twelve years.
Next, we do casting. People who attract attention in SFF in general and some little rewards for some longstanding fans of the series. I don't like the idea of the Captain being a returning ST actor, though. This series needs to be shiny, sparkly and new. If, say, we followed Captain Harry Kim, it becomes the Captain Harry Kim Show and not an ensemble thing that's really new. I want a female Captain, and if the network allowed it, a non-Terran. Andorian, or maybe based on my STO Captain, y'know, whatever. Reason being that we've never had that before and in a society where the President isn't often human, why are all the good postings given to human Captains?
For our Captain, I love the idea of Lexa Doig but I like Jaska Nichole (who I'll take in a lesser role as well) and Amanda Tapping would certainly attract attention. Additional crew, big names: Robert Carlyle, Allison Scagliotti, maybe Cliff Simon, maybe Aiden Turner, maybe Ed Quinn (he probably thinks he's a big name, at any rate). Some small names like Katie Findlay, Craig Veroni, Jaska Nichole (not sure how big of a name she is...), Mark Ghanime (see him as helmsman for some reason), Christopher Heyerdahl. There's a lot of acting power and recognizable faces in the bunch and most of them won't eat too big a portion of our seasonal budget.
And the people who would are the recurring cast. Make Felicia Day pop in now and again. Captain of a ship that our bold crew is working with for a story arch maybe? Summer Glau? If he's not on the crew, Cliff Simon for sure. James Callis? And we can get the occasional super-big, someone popular in the mainstream, with the money saved by filling the crew with SF actors. Of course, we can do some guest stars that aren't big-budget choices like Ray Wise, who are just phenomenal fun to see on screen.
Then we turn attention to the usual suspects. We need to tie in crews from previous installments, right? Start with Kate Mulgrew. She's a pretty hot commodity in television right now, and Admiral Janeway would be a great way to christen our brand new ship. We can use Robert Picardo too, though aging would need to be explained, considering he was a hologram. Coming up with a way to involve Avery Brooks would be nice, but I'd like to steer clear of the pseudo-religiousness of DS9; been there, done that, you know? I'd love to bring back Ezri Dax, but honestly that's mostly because I thought she was cute.
How do we blow our budget if not with actors? Obvious, isn't it? In the golden age that was the late 90s and early oughts, ST stood about shoulder-to-shoulder with it's competitors, but there was more SF on television back then, we now want the same slice of a smaller pie. We need to wow people. We need to be as strong as Doctor Who on it's best day and we need to do it with a smaller budget and larger cast. The pressures this show will face are very, very reminiscent of Doctor Who 2005 only on this side of the Atlantic.
Which is why we set all this groundwork before I got to the plot, which is the central thrust of a very unnecessarily detailed strategy considering this is all a thought experiment.
Plot
People seem to be loving darker, more dismal outlooks on the future these days. That trend has been building for a while and you can see it played bare in Abramstrek. While we need that club in our bag, that's not what Trek's meant to be - we need to be ambitious and optimistic. The conflict doesn't need to be the raging against the dying of the light or how Section 31 is taking over the Federation, the conflict needs to be our optimism and ideals against a universe that wants to challenge those ideals.
This series would be Starfleet trying to remind both Federation worlds and the viewers who've fallen into this cynical nature that the core ideals of Trek are to be the best version of yourself. But the Federation was recently at war, and faith in it's preeminence and nobility is waning at home and abroad. What's a government to do? Starfleet commissions a dozen ships of a new class, our crew is on the titular ship; NX-######, USS Whateverthisclassiscalled. Like the Sovereign was for its class, or Intrepid for its. And these dozen ships are given a largely ceremonial mission to reignite the spirit of the Federation: boldly go where no one has gone before.
The challenges are a bit different this time, because instead of just being about travel and exploration and being an episodic adventure, a background narrative is formed of the struggle to restore hope in a weary and (often rightfully) pessimistic world. To some, this mission, symbolic though it is, seems tone-deaf and self-congratulatory, and that should be clear from the outset. Our Pilot (which "Boldly Go" or "These are the Voyages" could be cute titles to book-end the long time without Trek on television) would feature a scene where twelve Captains, some of them being our big cameos and people we'll see again later, are meeting with one another (and possibly a familiar-faced Admiral like Janeway or Riker) and discussing that very public perception and the fact that these twelve ships are not seeking out new worlds so much as they're seeking the soul of the Federation, the wonder and devotion to discovery that made the superpower great.
As always, the Federation acts here as a stand-in for the US, NATO, UN and so on, a people bitter and jaded who yearn for the things that made them great, and our show's proxy for government actually knows how to give that to them. The challenge is convincing them that the effort is meaningful and genuine, even if it might only be meaningful and genuine because twelve Captains and an Admiral decided to make it so. It should give people the feeling that a small group of dedicated people can, in fact, change the world. Or worlds. And it should also be a reminder that that is the only thing that ever does.
The rest of the pilot is the crew massing at the ship a la most first episodes of Trek. Some know one another, most don't. Some believe in their mission, some are cynical. Our Captain acknowledges the challenges, gives a rousing speech, and then we end on the order "Take us out."
From there we finish out the first half of season one playing our mission straight - quick tour of Federation worlds with stops along the way for something undiscovered and fascinating. We delve a bit more into character-focused storytelling than, say, TNG but we can't compromise our overall objectives for it like Doctor Who does from time to time. Its important to care deeply for the crew, though, so we want people to see their perspectives enough to make them really matter. Other Trek installments only rarely gave you glimpses into people's logs other than the Captain, and I want every log entry to convey more than what's gone on while you weren't watching - instead let it give you insight into a character as well. What does the Tactical officer think of the plague, is he or she frustrated with an enemy they can't kill? Does the Chief Medical Officer think this whole mission is a farce, but still want to do the most good for the most people? I want to understand them as people as quickly as possible.
After a few episodes of exposition serving mostly to show the tone of the crew and the Federation at large, we start into plotlines. Here we can borrow the emerging model in SF which is our episodic side starts laying groundwork for our larger plot, but we can afford to do this writ large since we have three seasons contractually. So not only should our episodes lead to a larger revelation near the end of each season and a feeling things've been connected from day one, but by the end of season three people should see the breadcrumbs of the shocking disaster or dramatic turn all the way back to some seemingly small detail in our pilot episode.
The writers should work together to flesh out a framework for this plan they can all live with. Personally, I'd kind of like to see some plot threads left to dangle by previous Trek installments tied together for our new series. The Vodwar from Voyager had the ability to travel to the Alpha Quadrant in months; it's been thirty-five years, have they rebuilt? Made friends who want to influence the course of the Federation, or burn it to the ground? And it isn't like there are a shortage of enemies the Federation has that wouldn't like the idea of someone rekindling optimism and patriotism. Another topic to explore is how the divergence of the Romulan Star Empire and the Romulan Republic is very reflective of Romulus and Vulcan - mining STO for plot points can only help out STO's exposure and thereby its activity.
So we have the general framework, the early episodes can be written shortly after bringing together the staff, and rather than give in to the trend running through ideas of the future, we stick with classic Trek and try to remind people what hope is for. Am I forgetting anything?
Yes. I want a TRIBBLE relationship between two crew members. But that one's more just for me.
Vice Admiral Meria Farron USS Stradivarius
NX-163292
Comments
Long form snails pace quality - HBO does trek, great for the tiny audience that would watch. This is what I'd like and couldn't care less about the setting if it was done well.
Abrams big bangs - too expensive to do well on TV and not Trek, there are lots of superhero cartoons for people that want that stuff and a new Star Wars one coming later this year.
STNG, DS9, Voyager style show - more of the same and that was getting old 10+ years ago. After BSG do people really want to go back to child and casual viewer friendly adventure of the week?
Old school TOS scifi stories - fine but I can't help but notice that shows like the Twilight Zone don't get made any more and are there the Bixby level writers to do it?
Enterprise jumped between one type and another and they couldn't figure out a balance in time, lack of interesting characters and that damned song didn't help.
I have no idea how you make a show that is enjoyable to people that watch CSI and those that prefer soviet art films to superhero reboots, without going the HBO route and losing casual viewers.
I had in mind for my post something formatted similarly to DS9 or Stargate SG-1: good myth arc with season-long sub-arcs, but episodic enough that you can miss an episode and still be able to follow it (and SG-1 usually stuck a "previously on" in the continuity-heavy episodes anyway). And given it's set in a scenario where the Federation is basically on its last legs militarily (it starts with the enemy capturing Earth, for Pete's sake), it'd definitely be more like nBSG or late DS9 in tone than like the other series.
— Sabaton, "Great War"
Check out https://unitedfederationofpla.net/s/
Is there a canonical future in the mythos? In Enterprise and Voyager the future for the Fed looked pretty good with those temporal ships
The first, I'm really not seeing it happen, because "it's been done before". It could be a Federation ship in another galaxy, but that is so Voyager+Stargate that it doesn't even make sense. Anything in the Alfa and Beta quadrants is also old news.
The sencond would be a "Red Squad" story like. I very much like the idea of a ship of cadets being cut out from the Federation. It allows for great character development, the shaping of Starfleet officers as they struggle to raise to the standard we came to expect, conditioned by their particular situation, their morals and principles always hanging in the balance with each decision. This story would allow for the old exploration "thing" behind enemy lines, trying to find new tech, intel and hitting the enemy covertly wherever possible.
We'll have to agree to disagree. I watched the reimagined BSG end-to-end after a month long Star Trek binge, and I can honestly say it was easily one of the best Sci-Fi shows i've seen in recent years.
As for a new Trek show; I honestly think i'd set it around the time that we play STO in. We've got political upheavals, planetary-wide disasters. The barabarians (figuratively and literally) are at the gates.
I imagine places like Earth are not the Utopia's once seen in the show. With the threat of war with the Klingons, the Undine inflitrations, the Borg incursions and now the Dyson Spheres, I dare say Earth and other Fed worlds are pretty paranoid right now.
Season one:
Small Federation patrol ship from the movie Era. (reuses Miranda models.)
This is not one of the glory ships like Enterprise or Excelsior. This is the ship that goes out to do the less glamourous jobs. Older captain just looking to put in his time till he can retire with all his pieces intact.
His last mission ended he has to do one more tour to go home to the quiet he ran from and now misses.
With the ship having finished a tour you get to see a handful of grizzled officers leaving this beat up ship as new officers are assigned to the billet.
An ancestor of Soong is assigned as a science officer. (NOT Brent Spiner. Use Spiner as his/her father for the send off. Recommend making the character female so no one expects her to look too much like Spiner.)
Use an almost all human crew. (Keep costume costs to a minimum.)
Use virtual unknowns for main cast for budget and availability.
Ship is sent to patrol the new open zone as the Khitomer accords have just changed the face of politics. Deal with the Syndicate and rogue Klingons that are violently unhappy with the new peace.
Not all new cast arrive in the pilot. Slot for replacements after a few episodes. Several months between starbases and unlike ships like Enterprise they can't just stop their patrol to take refugees to new homes on a whim. Use this to add a fish out of water character to explore how the Federation and star fleet does things. Recommend an orion smuggler. Used to getting things done by how is easiest this time. Not by some book. Has some sense of justice and right and wrong. (Not a slaver or drug runner. But bootleg entertainment and romulan ale can be profitable.) If the character proves popular to the fans. Keep him/her. If not they depart when they final reach the next station.
No more than three times in the season. Have Excelsior arrive and end a fight that would be tough for our little ship just by arriving. Show Sulu's replacement getting accolades just for showing up while our protagonists are sent back to work.
Season Two:
With the cast selected based on viewer popularity. Show the threads that had been barely seen in the first season to be the manipulation of the Tal Shiar. Our protagonists shift from their patrol to neutral worlds near the Romulan border as they work to uncover the plot by their crafty neighbors.
Season Three:
Last year of the patrol. With the links obvious to our protagonists they have a choice. Go behind the lines in Romulan space and find the final secrets. Or obey orders and let the politicians handle the situation. (yeah right)
The ever shifting issues in the romulan sphere make the actions of our protagonists force them to turn their attentions inward. The end of the season has them close their borders as they deal with the internal strife from their own actions.
Our protagonists finally return to the Utopia Planitia yards.
The ship to be refitted or scrapped. The crew reassigned or given a new mission.
All that would depend on if the producers green light a fourth season or not. .
Originally Posted by pwlaughingtrendy
Network engineers are not ship designers.
Nor should they be. Their ships would look weird.
I'd expect most production companies to be turned off by a show that doesn't focus on the Federation. I know that we all like the Klingons and Romulans but ostensibly, they've never been the main "characters" of any Star Trek series.
I can't help but wonder if that wouldn't be more of a draw than a put-off. Battlestar Galactica wasn't about hot nymphomaniacs trying to destroy humanity the first time around either, see.
It's possible. But I doubt we'd be able to use the sex appeal of Klingons to our advantage.
It depends how we're talking really. If this is a "if you could do it with no restraints" kind of question then sure, why not. If we're talking at least semi-realistically then i'm afraid it'd get passed over for something that's more Fed-centric.
Yeah, but if you look at what you end up doing at max level, the declaration of war is practically irrelevant. The Federation and the Klingons are working together on just about everything.
In fact, the standoff in the new FE is probably the closest you get to the threat of a full-scale conflict (from an in-story point of view) for a long time.
A show about a Wells Class timeship from the 29th century, travelling through time to ensure the timeline goes as it should. There would be a mix of stuff including exploration (involving timeline threatening anomalies and stuff), combat with bad guys trying to change the timeline and stuff, and of course, time traveling would let the crew of the ship visit various times that we know from the existing series.
Winning.
Oh, now don't tell me you want in on all this! Well, ok. Look this that Egg Pawn hanging outside your window, pointing his laser rifle at you, waiting for my next order. He's doing his part. He helps conquer the weak-minded. He roboticizes the weak-bodied. Heck, he even helps keep the useless people from causing any trouble, but you know what? Join. Find the closest Nataran Empire roboticization center near you and join the ranks, before the ranks find you. Oh, I know, you figure it must be so satisfying to know I basically rule the world now, and you know what? It is, but do you want to know the true definition of satisfaction? Well, let me tell you a little story. One day, you see a brand new event. They're giving out boxes that give old event stuff. Your dilithium is plentiful. You buy a whole lot of Phoenix packs on your main, and open them all. You get one epic token. Then, you decide, that since you have all the Breen ships and don't give a damn about the others, you exchange it for an ultra rare, and grab yourself a Jem'Hadar Attack Ship and for the hell of it, a Voth Bulwark. You open both, leaving the Bulwark in your vast masses of starships as you jump into the bugship and deck it out, deck by deck, into the most awesome Jem'Hadar ship you can. You fly it. You enjoy it. Eventually, you get bored and leave, leaving the old Bulwark never flown... until later. Your main is long complete. Your new alt main, based off some character you pulled out of nothing just to explain away some starship being in service without the command of your dear admiral, is also complete. Mostly. Their reps and doffs are hard at work, getting you stuff. You realize the potential, and head back for your dear admiral, pull the most Voth themed build you can out of thin air, and suit up in your giant ship in the shape of you know what. You head out... and cause all sorts of havoc. Enemies scream out your name as their very life is drained away by your swarms of Aceton Assimilators. They complain to the devs of your OPness when you revive yourself from death every time you die. Do you show any form of mercy? No. After all, this isn't the United Federation of Planets, this is mother frakkin' Starfleet, where you explore strange new worlds and kick butt never kicked before. Oh, and you realize that I just wrote another speech rivaling your own signature. Cool. Oh, wait, that's just the original draft, it is part of my signature now. Oh, and yes, I am aware that I have become a Canadian Regent; one day, sooner than you'd expect, we'll suddenly decide to take over the world and declare an "alliance", and I shall become it's Regent. You know, like the Klingon-Cardassian Alliance in the mirror universe of our beloved Star Trek. Oh, who'll we be taking over with? I dunno, maybe [REDACTED], or maybe aliens from outer space. Guess you'll have to wait and find out, won't we? Until then, don't ask too many questions, or else my Breen allies on Titania might pick up on your -- [REDACTED BY BREEN CONFEDERACY FOR REASONS] Also, psst... keep an eye out for flying Tribbles! Also walls. Big, great walls, separating entire continents apart. Walls patrolled by Tribbles. Flying Tribbles. Flying Nukara Tribbles. Don't worry, it's not like they were on Venus with a herd of Tholians or anything, they just like the extreme heat and brutal weather like acid rain and hurricane force winds as the norm. Oh, and definitely keep your eye out on any two-tailed foxes, because if they ain't glowing, they're definitely an imposter. Possibly an Undine, we caught one of those once in my place once. Oh, and if you find a two-tailed fox that doesn't like the cold... most certainly ask him to say sorry. If he refuses, DESTROY HIM WITH A DOOMSDAY MACHINE, BECAUSE THERE'S NOTHING ELSE THAT WOULD BE ENOUGH AGAINST SUCH AN OVERPOWERED IMPOSTER!
tr;dr, I am winning last post wins 3.0. Thank you for your time.
(See link below.)
"Star Trek: Rubicon" Season 1, Season 2 A new era, a new time, a new crew, a new ship, a new mission...
"I rather believe that time is a companion who goes with us on the journey and reminds us to cherish every moment because it will never come again."- Jean-Luc Picard
So, my pitch?
Cast, Staff, Budgetary Concerns and Expenditures
First comes snagging some SF writers with talent. Braga's work was usually amazing on previous Trek installments, and though we've gone a few years without a decent space odyssy, there's still plenty of talent in that pool. I'd love to see how Robert Hewitt Wolfe worked withing the framework I'm about to set out, particularly after seeing the original plans for Andromeda. Hell, maybe snag a Stargate writer or two? Their attempt at space odyssey was atrocious IMO, but they did 'military explorers' fantastic for twelve years.
Next, we do casting. People who attract attention in SFF in general and some little rewards for some longstanding fans of the series. I don't like the idea of the Captain being a returning ST actor, though. This series needs to be shiny, sparkly and new. If, say, we followed Captain Harry Kim, it becomes the Captain Harry Kim Show and not an ensemble thing that's really new. I want a female Captain, and if the network allowed it, a non-Terran. Andorian, or maybe based on my STO Captain, y'know, whatever. Reason being that we've never had that before and in a society where the President isn't often human, why are all the good postings given to human Captains?
For our Captain, I love the idea of Lexa Doig but I like Jaska Nichole (who I'll take in a lesser role as well) and Amanda Tapping would certainly attract attention. Additional crew, big names: Robert Carlyle, Allison Scagliotti, maybe Cliff Simon, maybe Aiden Turner, maybe Ed Quinn (he probably thinks he's a big name, at any rate). Some small names like Katie Findlay, Craig Veroni, Jaska Nichole (not sure how big of a name she is...), Mark Ghanime (see him as helmsman for some reason), Christopher Heyerdahl. There's a lot of acting power and recognizable faces in the bunch and most of them won't eat too big a portion of our seasonal budget.
And the people who would are the recurring cast. Make Felicia Day pop in now and again. Captain of a ship that our bold crew is working with for a story arch maybe? Summer Glau? If he's not on the crew, Cliff Simon for sure. James Callis? And we can get the occasional super-big, someone popular in the mainstream, with the money saved by filling the crew with SF actors. Of course, we can do some guest stars that aren't big-budget choices like Ray Wise, who are just phenomenal fun to see on screen.
Then we turn attention to the usual suspects. We need to tie in crews from previous installments, right? Start with Kate Mulgrew. She's a pretty hot commodity in television right now, and Admiral Janeway would be a great way to christen our brand new ship. We can use Robert Picardo too, though aging would need to be explained, considering he was a hologram. Coming up with a way to involve Avery Brooks would be nice, but I'd like to steer clear of the pseudo-religiousness of DS9; been there, done that, you know? I'd love to bring back Ezri Dax, but honestly that's mostly because I thought she was cute.
How do we blow our budget if not with actors? Obvious, isn't it? In the golden age that was the late 90s and early oughts, ST stood about shoulder-to-shoulder with it's competitors, but there was more SF on television back then, we now want the same slice of a smaller pie. We need to wow people. We need to be as strong as Doctor Who on it's best day and we need to do it with a smaller budget and larger cast. The pressures this show will face are very, very reminiscent of Doctor Who 2005 only on this side of the Atlantic.
Which is why we set all this groundwork before I got to the plot, which is the central thrust of a very unnecessarily detailed strategy considering this is all a thought experiment.
Plot
People seem to be loving darker, more dismal outlooks on the future these days. That trend has been building for a while and you can see it played bare in Abramstrek. While we need that club in our bag, that's not what Trek's meant to be - we need to be ambitious and optimistic. The conflict doesn't need to be the raging against the dying of the light or how Section 31 is taking over the Federation, the conflict needs to be our optimism and ideals against a universe that wants to challenge those ideals.
This series would be Starfleet trying to remind both Federation worlds and the viewers who've fallen into this cynical nature that the core ideals of Trek are to be the best version of yourself. But the Federation was recently at war, and faith in it's preeminence and nobility is waning at home and abroad. What's a government to do? Starfleet commissions a dozen ships of a new class, our crew is on the titular ship; NX-######, USS Whateverthisclassiscalled. Like the Sovereign was for its class, or Intrepid for its. And these dozen ships are given a largely ceremonial mission to reignite the spirit of the Federation: boldly go where no one has gone before.
The challenges are a bit different this time, because instead of just being about travel and exploration and being an episodic adventure, a background narrative is formed of the struggle to restore hope in a weary and (often rightfully) pessimistic world. To some, this mission, symbolic though it is, seems tone-deaf and self-congratulatory, and that should be clear from the outset. Our Pilot (which "Boldly Go" or "These are the Voyages" could be cute titles to book-end the long time without Trek on television) would feature a scene where twelve Captains, some of them being our big cameos and people we'll see again later, are meeting with one another (and possibly a familiar-faced Admiral like Janeway or Riker) and discussing that very public perception and the fact that these twelve ships are not seeking out new worlds so much as they're seeking the soul of the Federation, the wonder and devotion to discovery that made the superpower great.
As always, the Federation acts here as a stand-in for the US, NATO, UN and so on, a people bitter and jaded who yearn for the things that made them great, and our show's proxy for government actually knows how to give that to them. The challenge is convincing them that the effort is meaningful and genuine, even if it might only be meaningful and genuine because twelve Captains and an Admiral decided to make it so. It should give people the feeling that a small group of dedicated people can, in fact, change the world. Or worlds. And it should also be a reminder that that is the only thing that ever does.
The rest of the pilot is the crew massing at the ship a la most first episodes of Trek. Some know one another, most don't. Some believe in their mission, some are cynical. Our Captain acknowledges the challenges, gives a rousing speech, and then we end on the order "Take us out."
From there we finish out the first half of season one playing our mission straight - quick tour of Federation worlds with stops along the way for something undiscovered and fascinating. We delve a bit more into character-focused storytelling than, say, TNG but we can't compromise our overall objectives for it like Doctor Who does from time to time. Its important to care deeply for the crew, though, so we want people to see their perspectives enough to make them really matter. Other Trek installments only rarely gave you glimpses into people's logs other than the Captain, and I want every log entry to convey more than what's gone on while you weren't watching - instead let it give you insight into a character as well. What does the Tactical officer think of the plague, is he or she frustrated with an enemy they can't kill? Does the Chief Medical Officer think this whole mission is a farce, but still want to do the most good for the most people? I want to understand them as people as quickly as possible.
After a few episodes of exposition serving mostly to show the tone of the crew and the Federation at large, we start into plotlines. Here we can borrow the emerging model in SF which is our episodic side starts laying groundwork for our larger plot, but we can afford to do this writ large since we have three seasons contractually. So not only should our episodes lead to a larger revelation near the end of each season and a feeling things've been connected from day one, but by the end of season three people should see the breadcrumbs of the shocking disaster or dramatic turn all the way back to some seemingly small detail in our pilot episode.
The writers should work together to flesh out a framework for this plan they can all live with. Personally, I'd kind of like to see some plot threads left to dangle by previous Trek installments tied together for our new series. The Vodwar from Voyager had the ability to travel to the Alpha Quadrant in months; it's been thirty-five years, have they rebuilt? Made friends who want to influence the course of the Federation, or burn it to the ground? And it isn't like there are a shortage of enemies the Federation has that wouldn't like the idea of someone rekindling optimism and patriotism. Another topic to explore is how the divergence of the Romulan Star Empire and the Romulan Republic is very reflective of Romulus and Vulcan - mining STO for plot points can only help out STO's exposure and thereby its activity.
So we have the general framework, the early episodes can be written shortly after bringing together the staff, and rather than give in to the trend running through ideas of the future, we stick with classic Trek and try to remind people what hope is for. Am I forgetting anything?
Yes. I want a TRIBBLE relationship between two crew members. But that one's more just for me.
USS Stradivarius
NX-163292
Author of Reprise