# What Should the Next Incarnation of Trek Be? **URL:** \ **Category:** Cafe Society\ **Created:** [May 15, 2005, 1:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-should-the-next-incarnation-of-trek-be/303890 "2005-05-15T01:35:03Z")\ **Posts on this page:** 20\ **Page:** 1
**Author:** ![Tuckerfan](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/eada6e/32.png) [@Tuckerfan](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Tuckerfan)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2005, 1:35am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-should-the-next-incarnation-of-trek-be/303890/1 "2005-05-15T01:35:03Z")
_Enterprise_ is dead (and thank Og for it, I thought that it was going to take a wooden stake to get rid of the damned thing) and regardless if the franchise is allowed to lie fallow or not, sooner or later, someone at Paramount is going to decide to try and milk that cow again. So what _should_ it be? Obviously, it should be free of the current producers and writers, so let’s suppose that the keys to the franchise are turned over to people with brains (yeah, I know, a cold day in Hell will happen first, but anyway. . .), who at least have the decency to release a clip of them sitting around and saying, “We’re **sorry** for _Enterprise_ and as far as we’re concerned, it **never happened**.” ---
**Author:** ![Mr.Blue\_Sky](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/d26b3c/32.png) [@Mr.Blue\_Sky](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mr.Blue_Sky)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2005, 1:38am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-should-the-next-incarnation-of-trek-be/303890/2 "2005-05-15T01:38:08Z")
There should be at least a 5 year wait before they try anything new. I’ve mentioned this before, but why not a series of 2 hour TV movies based on some of the many novels? They’d be cheaper than making a theatrical release. How about an origin of the Borg story? ---
**Author:** ![Mockingbird](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/c68b51/32.png) [@Mockingbird](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mockingbird)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2005, 1:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-should-the-next-incarnation-of-trek-be/303890/3 "2005-05-15T01:39:06Z")
I think they need to let the fields rest and perhaps plant some mint or another thing that will renew the fields. Perhaps using Wil Wheaton as fertilizer would help. 😃 ---
**Author:** ![carnivorousplant](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnivorousplant/32/3563_2.png) [@carnivorousplant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carnivorousplant)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2005, 1:43am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-should-the-next-incarnation-of-trek-be/303890/4 "2005-05-15T01:43:49Z")
> [@Mr. Blue Sky](#): > > based on some of the many novels? Because the novels suck. 🙂 Where do you get five years? I’d have Federation characters, Klingon, Vulcan, Andorians and maybe Bajorans. Have an arc or a mini series for each group, have them encounter each other once in a while and kill some of them off. ---
**Author:** ![Mr.Blue\_Sky](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/d26b3c/32.png) [@Mr.Blue\_Sky](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Mr.Blue_Sky)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2005, 1:52am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-should-the-next-incarnation-of-trek-be/303890/5 "2005-05-15T01:52:09Z")
> [@carnivorousplant](#): > > Because the novels suck. 🙂 > Where do you get five years? I haven’t read any of the novels, but I understand that a few don’t suck. Five years? Just an opinion. ---
**Author:** ![Kyla](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/k/eada6e/32.png) [@Kyla](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Kyla)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2005, 1:57am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-should-the-next-incarnation-of-trek-be/303890/6 "2005-05-15T01:57:59Z")
How about something at Starfleet Academy? That could be cool. Or it could suck rocks. One or the other. ---
**Author:** ![Askia](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/a/96bed5/32.png) [@Askia](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Askia)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2005, 1:59am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-should-the-next-incarnation-of-trek-be/303890/7 "2005-05-15T01:59:18Z")
Either Star Trek: Federation (ST:FED) using **carnivorousplant’s** idea of rotating multi-part story arcs from different species throughout the Trek universe or Star Trek: Starfleet Academy (ST:SFA) set on post ST:DS9 Earth. I’d prefer the first idea. It would allow writers to plumb and expand the Trek universe from everything to warp drive to new planets and social histories and future crimes; to tighten up continuity between series; to allow for more intra-series character crossovers between the crews of ENT, TOS, TNG, DS9 and VGR. ---
**Author:** ![JRDelirious](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/jrdelirious/32/9531_2.png) [@JRDelirious](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JRDelirious)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2005, 2:06am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-should-the-next-incarnation-of-trek-be/303890/8 "2005-05-15T02:06:15Z")
Put me in with those calling for a hiatus. Maybe an ocassional _small-scale_ one-shot or miniseries based on a specific character or event, but declared to NOT be on any grand timeline, just a curious side-story in the trekverse. But let the franchise lie down for a while so we can determine if there really is life left there. ---
**Author:** ![JThunder](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/j/e95f7d/32.png) [@JThunder](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/JThunder)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2005, 2:09am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-should-the-next-incarnation-of-trek-be/303890/9 "2005-05-15T02:09:44Z")
Rumor has it that the next _Trek_ series will revisit the _ST:Voyager_ concept – except that this time, they plan to get it right. _Star Trek: Voyager II_ will revolve around the efforts of a valiant crew to escape from a planetoid in the Delta quadrant. The cast will consist of an overweight starship Captain, his bumbling first officer, a wealthy Ferengi merchant and his naked wife, a Vulcan Science Academy instructor, an Orion holodeck movie starlet, and a comely Terran farm girl. Most of the plots will revolve around the academy instructor’s efforts to jury-rig a warp-capable ship or a subspace radio, but these efforts will be invariably foiled by the first mate’s sheer incompetence. Sounds like a winner to me. ---
**Author:** ![carnivorousplant](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnivorousplant/32/3563_2.png) [@carnivorousplant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carnivorousplant)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2005, 2:15am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-should-the-next-incarnation-of-trek-be/303890/10 "2005-05-15T02:15:04Z")
_Wesley’s Planetoid._ ---
**Author:** ![Revtim](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/revtim/32/1042_2.png) [@Revtim](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Revtim)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2005, 2:16am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-should-the-next-incarnation-of-trek-be/303890/11 "2005-05-15T02:16:01Z")
Why do all the Star Trek series/movies have to take place in the future? Make one that takes place in the past! And I don’t mean people from the future who went back in time; I mean contempory people in say, 1850. Who just happen to be really smart, and built a warp-capable starship. Out of wood. Powered by steam, or guys on treadmills. ---
**Author:** ![carnivorousplant](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/carnivorousplant/32/3563_2.png) [@carnivorousplant](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/carnivorousplant)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2005, 2:31am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-should-the-next-incarnation-of-trek-be/303890/12 "2005-05-15T02:31:50Z")
> [@Revtim](#): > > Who just happen to be really smart, and built a warp-capable starship. Out of wood. Powered by steam, or guys on treadmills. Like _The Secret Adventures of Jules Verne_ steampunk stuff. Cool. ---
**Author:** ![rjung](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/r/45deac/32.png) [@rjung](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/rjung)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2005, 6:56am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-should-the-next-incarnation-of-trek-be/303890/13 "2005-05-15T06:56:38Z")
**Star Trek: New Frontier,** dammit! Either that, or a hiatus. Or both. ---
**Author:** ![Max\_the\_Immortal](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/m/6de8d8/32.png) [@Max\_the\_Immortal](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Max_the_Immortal)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2005, 7:29am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-should-the-next-incarnation-of-trek-be/303890/14 "2005-05-15T07:29:36Z")
From what I recall of the Voyager finale, Voyager returned to Earth tricked out with all sorts of fancy upgrades from like that Janeway brought from the future (er, further into the future); Voyager was able to tear through Borg ships effortlessly. I’d like to see a miniseries about the repercussions of the Federation getting ahold of this technology. First they’d smack down the Borg, then, drunk with power and with the best intentions, they embark on a military campaign to unite the galaxy under the Federation’s banner. Big giant war breaks out. ---
**Author:** ![GuanoLad](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/guanolad/32/42_2.png) [@GuanoLad](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/GuanoLad)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2005, 7:42am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-should-the-next-incarnation-of-trek-be/303890/15 "2005-05-15T07:42:41Z")
The Enterprise K comes back from a five year mission in relative isolation to find the Federation is destroyed. A quadrant-wide war has caused such extreme chaos that it’s extremely difficult to even discover what happened and who was at fault. A ragtag group of survivors have to find out what happened, who caused it, then overcome and defeat them. Will the Federation ever be rebuilt? Should it? Any of the team may be a traitor. Who can you trust? Any character could die at any time. Who? When? Why? Compelling television. Take the lead from this new generation of TV that has created such great approaches as Galactica and Lost and Carnivale to really take Trek to a gritty realism it needs to be to get anywhere. ---
**Author:** ![Derleth](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/d/b9e5f3/32.png) [@Derleth](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Derleth)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2005, 9:12am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-should-the-next-incarnation-of-trek-be/303890/16 "2005-05-15T09:12:59Z")
I would like a Borg-centric storyline, but didn’t they ruin the Borg at some point? (Bad question, I know. They’ve ruined _everything_ at some point.) Ideally, the Borg should be a _pure_ hive-mind: No hierarchy beyond temporary squads put together for specific tasks, no ‘Borg Queen’ or ‘Central Mind’ or _anything_ from that goddamned stupid movie. Each cube should be a perfect, self-sustaining entity with the sole goal of assimilating everything it comes across. (At this point, I’m going to be killed for yanking 7 of 9 out of continuity. And the people I’ll be killed by are much better at yanking than I am. ;)) Most importantly, it shouldn’t be possible for humans or other humanoid species to communicate with individual Borg drones. It shouldn’t be possible for anything human-like enough to build a character around to comprehend the Borg beyond their basic directive to assimilate. Just as the Borg fundmentally _cannot comprehend_ why anyone would _refuse_ assimilation, normal humanoids shouldn’t be able to comprehend why the Borg utterly refuse negotiation. As the series progresses, the Borg could realize that the best way to assimilate everyone is to make assimilation more ‘attractive’ in physical terms, like the angler fish evolved a pretty glowing light in order to more effectively catch prey in the inky blackness. The implants would become less and less visible, to the point of disappearing from the skin, and they would allow more and more of the individual to remain until all that’s left is a missionary zeal and an infectious nanoparasite that hooks the brain up to something that’s still inhuman and incomprehensible but much better evolved to fish for humans. (On second thought, that might not be as bizarre as I’d hoped.) ---
**Author:** ![Spudo](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/s/bbce88/32.png) [@Spudo](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Spudo)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2005, 10:39am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-should-the-next-incarnation-of-trek-be/303890/17 "2005-05-15T10:39:02Z")
What should the next incarnation of Trek be? Well written! I don’t care what the premise is, but if they have a poor writing staff it won’t matter, it’ll still suck. ---
**Author:** ![tarragon918](https://avatars.discourse-cdn.com/v4/letter/t/d26b3c/32.png) [@tarragon918](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/tarragon918)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2005, 11:36am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-should-the-next-incarnation-of-trek-be/303890/18 "2005-05-15T11:36:00Z")
Heh, \*\* Spudo \*\* has a -very good- point which I have to agree with - good writing is an absolute **MUST**. With that in mind, there is very little I wouldn’t mind seeing as the next TREK incarnation, although perhaps follow-ups on DS9 (particularly if they include Bajorans & Ferengi … :P) might just tip the balance for me. 😉 I so wish that they hadn’t screwed up things so badly with **Enterprise** , though, especially the whole Temporal Cold War arc and the attack on Earth. What a mess to try to deal with!! It would be easier to just erase the damage - this is one major reason why they shouldn’t go back and do pre-quels. Heh. They need only look to the Star Wars franchise to see the damage done there, IMHO. Not that it kept me from seeing the movies, mind you, nor even from enjoying them (well, except for Jar-Jar …!!!). But they \*ucked up -a lot- of stuff!!! That stated, I wouldn’t mind seeing some “early” Starfleet Academy stuff or early Federation stuff (yeah, more Tellarites!!!). I like **CP’s** idea too - show us other races, what’s going on with them, backstory on their worlds, etc. - like arcs focusing on Andorians and their culture, Betazeds and their culture, etc. Of course, Tellarites and their culture is number one. 🙂 But the main thing is to ensure that the writing is GOOD. You know, it wouldn’t hurt them to take a look at some fan fiction either - I know there is a whole lot of drek out there, but there’s also some very good stuff, some of it very well-written. JMHO, mind you. ---
**Author:** ![Grrr](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/grrr/32/146_2.png) [@Grrr](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Grrr)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2005, 11:44am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-should-the-next-incarnation-of-trek-be/303890/19 "2005-05-15T11:44:54Z")
How about one centered around the (and I caan’t even begin to spell this word) the “Maw-key”? or what ever the hell they’re called. I particularly like this idea because you could make the Federation look like the bad guys. ---
**Author:** ![Grrr](https://sea3.discourse-cdn.com/straightdope/user_avatar/boards.straightdope.com/grrr/32/146_2.png) [@Grrr](https://boards.straightdope.com/u/Grrr)\ **Post date:** [May 15, 2005, 11:48am UTC](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-should-the-next-incarnation-of-trek-be/303890/20 "2005-05-15T11:48:05Z")
Oh, and we need a flamboyantly gay space captain too. Now I’d pay money to see that. [Next page](https://boards.straightdope.com/t/what-should-the-next-incarnation-of-trek-be/303890.md?page=2)