Mark my words. There can be no Trek! While Bergama lives.
If either of those guys have any hand in this, it will suck the matter back out of a black hole. Even if Paramount has truly completely removed Berman and Bragga from the equation, this prequel idea is still a set up for failure, imho. They need to go forward, not back.
*Star Trekking
Across the Universe
Boldly going forward
Cause they can’t find reverse*
Technology Unchained Utopia (TUU)
We’ve discussed it a few times on these boards. A search of that phrase might pull up some stuff you’ll want to read.
As I posted in the later-started-then-closed thread about this, even JJ Abrams has to be better for Star Trek than Berman and Braga. Hell, three mentally-impaired monkeys on crack would be better for Star Trek than Berman and Braga…
Oh, I agree, believe me! I’m just not convinced that we can be sure that that disease is wholly gone. Remember between Seasons 3 and 4 of ENT when all the news from Paramount was that Manny Coto was now in charge and then it was revealed at the start of the season that he was only one third in charge, Bergama still being alive? That’s what I’m looking at. Pessimistic, true, but hey…
I always thought the Patton was the coolest ship in that book.
I think that this new Trek is going to blow Talosian Sand Weasels. Based on what we got with Enterpoop I predict that we can expect the following:[ul]
[li]Continuity? Wazzat?[/li][li]The Borg and/or Q will probably show up. Why? Because the writers will drag them out because they’re too stupid to come with something cool.[/li][li]Young Kirk/Spock/Whomever will meet old Kirk/Spock/Whomever. This will either be done via digital manipulation or hiring Shatner, etc. to reprise the character, or Og forbid (but most likely), both. This will be some kind of “super exciting” event in which if the events actually happened, they’d damn well remember them for the rest of their lives and talk about them. (Or if young Kirk helped old Kirk with the tribbles, don’t you think that old Kirk would say, “Aw yeah, I remember this shit. Scotty beam all them to the Klingon ship, except for one, I’ll need it for a toupee.” as soon as he saw ‘em?)[/li][li]Jonathan Frakes will appear via some kind of contrived plot device with an utterly implausible reason for him never remembering this shit.[/li][li]Young Kirk/Spock/Whomever will repeatedly say or do something which is so wildly out of character for their later incarnation that you’ll be unable to say, “Ah, well, that’s just him being young and brash.”[/ul][ul][*]Look and Feel.[/li]TOS just screams 1960s era design. One of the things that drove me batty about Enterpoop is that it looked better than TOS, when the gadgets, etc. should have looked worse. Enterpoop took place, what? A hundred or so years before TOS? In order for it to have looked right in the visual continuity department (Yeah, yeah, I know, they don’t need no stinkin’ continuity.) it needed to reflect early 1900s design philosophy. For Kirk and Spock: The Early Years to look right, the set design, etc. will need to reflect 1940s/1950s design sensibilities, instead from a visual standpoint we’ll get Star Trek: iPod.
[/ul]
[ul][li]Underlying Philosophy.[/li]One of the things that pissed me off about TNG was they let Frakes grow a beard. In TOS, they were military, dammit! (And we liked it!) Beard’s are generally not allowed in the military, and I can’t remember a Star Fleet officer in TOS whoever sported one (anti-Spock in Mirror, Mirror doesn’t count). Given that military discipline, etc., etc., etc., was tossed out in TNG, you can expect Starfleet Academy: 90210 to exhibit less discipline and general “militariness” than the worst inner city crack infested public school in the US. And PC? Aw, baby, you haven’t seen PC yet! This thing’ll be so PC that even hardcore PCers will be offended by it.[/ul]
[ul][li]Only Token References to TOS Aliens[/li]Yeah, yeah, I know, a lot of times in TOS they discovered races, but there were still plenty they encountered who were chums with the Federation for some time. I’m betting we get a Vulcan and the occassional Klingon thrown in, and that’s about it. Everything else will be a new race.[/ul]
They also completely forget about what Trek does best: Take current issues, slap a thin sci-fi veneer on 'em, and hash them out.
If they really want to put the swashbuckle back into Trek, then they need to the following, IMHO:
Ideally, the first film should open with apologies for ST:V, the nerfing of the Borg, parts of DS9, Insurrection, Nemesis, most of Voyager, and all of Enterpoop, (Of course, that will never happen.)
More realistically, the film should open in TNG-era Trekdom (the retro-stuff is waaaaaay too complicated from a continuity standpoint), with some oddball race that briefly cropped up in either TOS or TNG (I’d say DS9, but they’d probably go with the Changling crap again, instead of something better.) launching a devistating attack on the Federation. Make it a real “Oh shit!” moment, big explosions, lots of dead people, the works. Then shift to the President of the Federation accepting the resignation of the current head of Starfleet, followed by him appointing a new head, who gives a blood and thunder speech about how the Federation has grown soft and Starfleet along with it (crib heavily from Shakespeare) and that he’s going to change things. Next, show the discipline being put back into Starfleet (beards being shaved off, salutes given, etc.), the assembly of a new fleet of horribly beweaponed battle cruisers and the crews being formed up. You end the first film with the fleet warping into space on their way to do battle with the baddies. The rest of the films follows the fleet’s efforts to strike back and topple the baddies. In each film, you intercut between ships. You can still do the whole “boldly going” business, but you’ll have an underlying premise to help drive the plot along (since the newness of “boldly going” has pretty much worn off at this point).
Of course, even if they were to read this and think, “Hey! That’s a pretty good idea! Let’s do that instead!” they’d still scew it up. :rolleyes:
Of course, the ‘no beards’ rule will be relaxed for one especially evil Vulcan who has the chance to meet his doppelganger …
::: runs away and ducks flying Jeffries tubes :::
Uh, dang. Meant to Preview.
Tuckerfan, I think you are pretty much spot-on about all the reasons I have no hopes for any new Trek series or movie.
Interesting idea, in any case. The lack of a central ship will make it difficult to focus on any one specific group of people, which may be a good thing given how badly character development is often handled in Trek series. The militarization kick should be imposed, at least to some extent, on the home front as well, and at least some of the time should be devoted to showing how people cope (or don’t) with a suddenly more present and intrusive government. How much of the Federation is willing to rebel, and how badly does the central government want to keep them?
They already did this. It was called the Dominion War, and it was probably the best continuous run Star Trek ever had. 
And it blew chinks, IMHO. Mind you, I didn’t see very much of DS9 once they started it up, so maybe things got better, but the parts I saw weren’t good at all.
…
*…<trying to choose from a dozen highly inappropriate remarks that leapt immediately to mind>…
…<unable to make a choice>…
…<decides to leave well enough alone>…*
Wasn’t Chunks a gay character?
As for beards, the similarities to WWII submarines has been made again and again in the franchise. Beards were not at all uncommon in that branch of the military from various different countries.
And as we’ve found oh so many times on these boards while Trek Doping, it is very easy to come up with a paragraph or two of an idea for what we think would be cool, it’s quite another to get an entire screenplay greenlighted.
Oh I know why Par wants to reprise, a certaintude of some fan base at least giving it a chance no matter how much it stinks and no atter how inconcistent it is, and some extra media attention just because its Trek.
But why do we, as fans, want another one? What is that is appealing about Trek above any other SciFi? The Mission for Par to go on, boldly or otherwise, is to respect what has kept fans coming back to Trek while having original novel concepts that are gripping and exciting and fun, even a bit tounge-in-cheek.
So what has kept you wanting more Trek? Reasons may include things like Tuckerfans’s stated thin veneer of scifi on current events, respect for internal consistency within its world, and also some of Rodenberry’s sense of optimism about the future. Some of the formulaic things: a character struggling with human/non-human identity as a metaphor. What else is important? It isn’t that we care to find out more about Kirk’s youth. Without those why have it be Trek?
Not even submarines specifically, but the whole Navy thing. It’s been a somewhat on again/off again relationship, with the reasons for requiring bare faces usually having to do with the effective wearing of a gas mask, but since I can’t recall seeing any such safety gear on Enterprise-D, I guess by Riker’s time, it was okay.
Besides which Johnny had a very real need (irl) to balance out his head. I’m not talking about aesthetics, either! I mean weight. Apparantly his head is very top heavy, judging from the way it leans over so much.
Dammit, I like the optimisim of a near utopian Federation with dark threads running through it (Section 31). I like the tech that borders on superscience.
If you want something else, go watch Galactica or Firefly. I’ll be there watching with you, but leave me my Star Trek.
I’ve said it before, and I’ll say it again – what Trek really needs is Star Trek: New Frontier: The Movie
This just in… Berman’s Out!
and
Woohoo! One down, one to go…now who do I talk to to put a hit on Braga?
Well, word on the street is that he is knee deep in a new series idea, and neck deep in a new movie idea, neither one of them Trek. In fact, he seems to have personally alienated a lot of the old Trek crew by his ass head ways. Few of them would want to be on a project of his. (from my inside source)
Bodes well, my droogs! Bodes well!