If You Could Do a Star Trek Series what Would it be About?

[Dave]

But things are changing, from the Core the Borg begin to invade known space in all directions, but soon after a number of Borg vessels are destroyed without a fight it becomes obvious that the Borg are not invading, the Borg are fleeing. Something ancient even in Galactic terms has been stirred and now even the Borg flee in the face of this new relentless enemy.

That sounds Larry Niven-esque. That's not a problem. I think great distances in Star Trek (and hence the time taken to travel them) have always been a problem for the show. We had Kirk meeting beings from the Andromeda galaxy one week, from beyond some great barrier at the galactic edge, or travelling to find Sha Ka Ree at the galactic core, while still maintaining that a Quadrant is an enormous distance. Then in TNG and DS9 they has us believe the Bree, Tholians, Borg and Dominion still lived on the edges of known space. Then Voyager being "lost" but getting home using Borg transwarp corridors. If it is that easy, surely everyone used them. Such great distances should have taken generations to cross. So, when they showed Archer and his cohorts breaking early Warp speed records, and tried to make the Klingons seem far, far away, it never felt very believable.

 

[SilentRoamer]

That sounds Larry Niven-esque. That's not a problem. I think great distances in Star Trek (and hence the time taken to travel them) have always been a problem for the show. We had Kirk meeting beings from the Andromeda galaxy one week, from beyond some great barrier at the galactic edge, or travelling to find Sha Ka Ree at the galactic core, while still maintaining that a Quadrant is an enormous distance. Then in TNG and DS9 they has us believe the Bree, Tholians, Borg and Dominion still lived on the edges of known space. Then Voyager being "lost" but getting home using Borg transwarp corridors. If it is that easy, surely everyone used them. Such great distances should have taken generations to cross. So, when they showed Archer and his cohorts breaking early Warp speed records, and tried to make the Klingons seem far, far away, it never felt very believable.

The only Niven I have had the pleasure of reading is Niven and Purnelles The Burning City. Although Niven is on my hit list!

Totally agree with the distances and lack thereof of any internal consistency, I would suggest that they used the premise of the Transwarp from the films as a far more efficient and faster warp travel and just ignored continuity issues. I think a new series would necessarily take a large viewership from fans of the recent films, which includes a lot of non ST series fans.

They could still make the Galaxy reasonably traversable without making the story completely InterGalactic, although if I was making it I would go down that route.

My premise also contains:

1. A crew member from a species believed to be completely extinct, probably at the hands of the Borg and adding extra emotional dimension to this crew members story.
2. A non gendered, non humanoid alien, non oxygen breathing alien. Probably a floating gas bag like a small balloon that also had its own environmental suit and quarters (something B5 did that I was disappointed ST never did.)
3. Wouldn't it be nice to have a humanoid but non human captain, keep them relatively human but interesting backstory. Maybe points 1 and 3 could be killed with one stone.

Anyway this is sort of my basic premise on what I would like to see, I know others eschew the military aspect of ST and prefer other aspects and I would not want it to be wholly military, indeed a lot of my favorite episodes have no military conflict. But I would like to use that as the setting premise, would be great to juxtaposition the peace with the oncoming conflict.

 

[Dave]

The only Niven I have had the pleasure of reading is Niven and Purnelles The Burning City.

I only meant, and I'm not sure this is really a spoiler, that in his 'known space' books it is found that the galactic core is exploding and there is consequently a mass exodus away from the core by other species, much as you described. Despite the grand scope in scale of both distances and time within those stories (from one short set in 19th century India, to the very far future) they are all set within a quite small area of our own galactic arm.

Another problem with Star Trek would be directions. If we travel to the stars then there would only be two directions within our spiral galaxy - rimward and coreward. We aren't going to be jumping between arms very quickly, nor is there very much 'height' or 'depth' within an arm.

 

[SilentRoamer]

@Dave I do plan on reading Niven - sounds very interesting. Just throwing my thoughts at you!

I have to be honest I was inspired by having recently read A Fire upon the Deep by Vinge.

I don't see a problem with Rimward and Coreward and I think they could handwave away a lot of the distances involved. I think they would necessarily have to do this as we are beating the speed of light so we are essentially ignoring physics anyway!

If it was my show I wouldn't go into too much detail on distances. I would talk about "The League of Alligned Worlds" which I would reference billions of members - I would try and show an immense diversity in life forms, maybe have something non planetary based or something specific to Gas Giants.

The opening season could be us seeing the weirdest and wonderful places explored by the crew as they try to determine what is causing the Borg exodus from Core space. Maybe have some ancient species that predate some of the stars in the galaxy - earliest possible life following dense elements after second generation stars core collapse.

I would look at moving this to a more galactic scope in the second season as the nature of the enemy is revealed and it becomes apparent that the Core of all large galaxies with a sufficient SMBH are falling under attack.

I love the idea of ancient wars fought using the cosmos as a staging ground, wars so vast that only cosmic timescales can capture them.

I do get your underlying point about distances, I just think it only relies on a slightly larger suspension of disbelief than the current ST theories do.

Isn't warp 10 supposed to be infinite warp anyway or is that no longer canon? I remember that 10 was supposed to be unreachable at one point.

I love how we are debating plausibility of a TV show

 

[TWErvin2]

I'd do something focusing on the Gorn, and their society.

As a kid, I just enjoyed the Arena, the episode with the cheesy reptilian alien. Special effects might be a tad better now.

 

[Dave]

Isn't warp 10 supposed to be infinite warp anyway or is that no longer canon? I remember that 10 was supposed to be unreachable at one point.

I love how we are debating plausibility of a TV show

It might have been, when going over 8 meant the 'engin's canna take it,' but the original series and TNG scales were different. There was a "recalibration". TNG frequently went beyond 10 when the story required it. To be honest, I've no idea about canon on this after TNG, or the latest Abrams' films. I also don't think anyone in charge cares as long as it makes them money.

 

[thaddeus6th]

Without checking other responses, I'd repeat what I wrote on the STD thread.

Set it a few decades after DS9. Have the Alpha Quadrant riven with dissent and civil wars. The Federation's torn by those trying to return to a more open, freer society and those who believe hanging on to military might is essential, the Klingons by traditionalists opposed to the low born Chancellor Martok, Cardassia by rebels and collaborators.

Not only would it make a change from the typical "Explore a lot" model, it'd fit both the Star Trek universe and the modern political scene.

 

[KGeo777]

Re: Borg
They blew it when they had "Hugh" show up (even if they tried to undo the damage with the First Contact movie...I dont think a Borg Queen adds anything valuable to the concept--the leaderless Borg collective I think is much more scary).
But the idea of a boogeyman enemy didn't sit well with the Star Trek "understanding other cultures" theme.

True for the Vidians...Species 8472....

 

[thaddeus6th]

The Borg fleeing core space is an interesting idea. That said, they do feel a bit exhausted after the (rather good) First Contact film. A new Star Trek inevitably means older elements being included, but personally I'd try and use either as much new stuff or modernised stuff as possible.

Sick of reboots and prequels. Here and there, a prequel is a good idea but for something like Star Trek it just doesn't sit right with me.

 

[Dave]

But surely, the only good reason for doing any more Star Trek at all, is to be able to use the rich tapestry of aliens, cultures and history that already exists, and to expand upon and fill in the gaps? Few other franchises (in any media) have as well thought out aliens as Klingons and Romulans (with fashions, spoken and written languages, literature, house pets and even culinary dishes!!!) I agree about reboots and retconning of existing canon. The only reason I'm personally not keen on prequels is because the restrictions which that places on the writers naturally leads them to an inevitable retconning. The only good thing about the Abram's films is they can do whatever they like without wrecking the existing canon in the original universe.

 

[thaddeus6th]

Lore isn't only an advantage, it can be a burden. I wrote a bit about that in this guest blog for Mouse:
Em's Blog: Farscape is Better Than New Who by Thaddeus White

 

[lynnfredricks]

I think something that could be interesting is a new show, post DS 9 / Voyager, that causes a restriction on ultra-fast travel. Right now, traveling vast distances doesn't come at any risk. Exploration seems to have taken a back seat to "hey, let's jet back to the vacation planet" type plots, where long travels don't come at a cost.

Maybe at first, all the known starfaring civilizations in our galaxy start having their warp travels thrown terribly off, faster-than-light communications stops working, and so-fast-I-time-travel results in total destruction, and it takes a few decades for them to figure out that some unknown beacon at the heart of our galaxy has 'turned off'. Warp based travel suddenly requires a lot more processing and becomes 'point to point' as a result, with distances actually carrying greater risk.

After a rough 10-20 years, the major powers reconnect, but they decide they want to solve this problem so they launch a kind of prototype 'beacon ship' with several tethered ships from the major powers with it, to reach the center of our galaxy. That way, we could have a new 'mini-armada' show, with an appointed Mission Commander, but each ship having its own captain.

 

[Dave]

@lynnfredricks Were you thinking of the TNG episode Force of Nature? Scientists discovered that Warp drive was actually damaging subspace but they didn't have enough proof. The problem was never mentioned again.

 

[Vaz]

I'd make a series purely focused from the Romulan POV.

 

[Cathbad]

where long travels don't come at a cost.

Actually, there was a show on TNG that offered this problem: WARP travel was damaging space. At the end of the episode, they restricted travel to WARP 5 I think, until a solution could be found.

Unfortunately, they went nowhere with it. Too bad, because it had possibilities.

 

[Cathbad]

@lynnfredricks Were you thinking of the TNG episode Force of Nature? Scientists discovered that Warp drive was actually damaging subspace but they didn't have enough proof. The problem was never mentioned again.

Oops, Dave already mentioned it.

 

[Cathbad]

I'd make a series purely focused from the Romulan POV.

I'd love that!

But the majority of fans, I think would want Klingon POV instead.

 

[lynnfredricks]

@lynnfredricks Were you thinking of the TNG episode Force of Nature? Scientists discovered that Warp drive was actually damaging subspace but they didn't have enough proof. The problem was never mentioned again.

No, though I did see that episode. My problem with shows like this is that exploration doesn't come at any real cost. It is the mission, but it seemed like we saw it less and less with each show. Also, there is the problem that meaningful encounters rarely had long term effects.

With this concept, it would also be possible to have Romulan and Klingon ships, too. What Id also like to see is a bit more depth to both. In that horrible Nemesis movie, we learned about the Remans. It could be that the Romulan ship and the Klingon ship could have races & cultures that are specific to their regions of space as well. Id get those rubber foreheads off the Romulans, too.

 

[Galactic Journey]

I'd like something like Starship Exeter -- set in TOS time, ignoring all future and NuTrek references, but not involving the Enterprise crew at all. The recycling of Enterprise characters and plots makes a big universe very small.

 

[BAYLOR]

Star Trek 500 Years After. And by that I mean 500 years after next Generation.