Your rules if you were the showrunner on a Star Trek series

[DrDeth]

@Barbarian

Now you’re making me laugh.

The Enterprise is a lightly-armed science vessel, like almost everything else in Starfleet.

It was only after encountering the Borg that Starfleet decided to build an actual warship, the Defiant.

The Enterprise could and did defeat Romulan and Klingon battle-cruisers, and was referred to as such several times:

Battle cruiser

[terentii]

@Thudlow_Boink

I see the original idea of Star Trek as a set-in-space version of the ages-old type of story where a ship goes sailing from island to island and has a different adventure—encounters a different civilization or creature or mysterious artifact or character to interact with—at each island. Think The Odyssey or Sinbad the Sailor or The Voyage of the Dawn Treader.

At one point in the series’ development, Roddenberry and Solow considered using the title Gulliver’s Travels, with a captain of that name.

Imagine: Instead of “Trekkies,” today we might have “Gullies”…

[Raguleader]

@DSYoungEsq

The idea, as I understand it, was that Roddenberry was deliberately downplaying the idea that these people were in a military organization. They used military ranks, it is true, but so does the United States Maritime Service. But you don’t put marines on a civilian ship.

Besides, one quibble I have is that, even if they are marines, on the ship itself they perform the function of security. When I grew up on a Navy base, the marines who took care of such things weren’t called “marines”, they were called “security.” You didn’t say, “Call the Marines, my daughter’s lost on base!”, you said, “Get ahold of Security.”

Plus, it’s entirely possible they’d be Masters at Arms (what the Navy calls their security personnel), Security Forces (what the Air Force calls theirs), or a number of other names.

When you think about it, it’d be absurd to call them Marines, since they’re not in the sea, they’re in space.

My big rules would be continuity-centric. Don’t forget stuff that happened previously. If a character learned something, maybe have them not make the same mistakes. Or maybe do. People backslide all the time in real life, and that can cause drama. But then maybe Commander Hardass has to take Lieutenant Snuffy aside and give him a “Jalad at Tanagra” talk. Let characters get recognized for their accomplishments, let them get promoted. Maybe let them get demoted or otherwised punished over time for their screw-ups or other achievements that caused trouble. Let characters get reassigned and replaced over time. Maybe Commander Awesome’s exploits get him a choice posting on some Admiral’s staff, where he can pop up from time to time as a supporting character.

And yeah, maybe they get their hands on some great powerful piece of ancient alien supertech or frozen supersoldiers or whatever, but Starfleet Research and Development or the Department of Xenotechnology or something arrives to cart it away for study and safe storage. Either continue to use it when relevant, or justify why you can’t. Mind, if you justify once that it’s out of the heroes’ hands for good, you don’t need to bring it up every episode after.

And yeah, I’m all for bringing back skirts for everyone. We need Klingon Highlanders.

[DrDeth]

@Raguleader

My big rules would be continuity-centric. Don’t forget stuff that happened previously. If a character learned something, maybe have them not make the same mistakes

There’s a problem with this. That sort of Continuity means every writer has to know every episode that has aired, or that *will air *before their epi airs.

Since ST had various SF writers do many of the stories, this couldnt be done. Nor does it bother me.

In fact i prefer non-arcing episodes.

[ganthet]

[QUOTE=Barbarian]

Starfleet is a paramilitary organization. They have ranks, they have some weapons, they are capable of self-defence.

But they are woefully equipped to wage war and all that entails.
[/QUOTE]

Whether they are woefully equipped is not the point - Starfleet is the force that wages war. They protect and defend borders and planets, engage enemy ships, and assault enemy worlds. Even in TOS, Starfleet was the force that fought the Romulan war and the Enterprise itself was fighting in the brief Klingon war. TNG and DS9 have mentioned the Cardassian war and the Tzenkethi wars that Starfleet fought and O’Brien in particular was involved in ground combat. All before the Defiant.

[DinoR]

1. Kill, for good, the silly notion that everyone is an officer…except for the occasional stray “Crewman” or Chief. We will have a senior noncommissioned officer as a major member of the cast, like OBrien in DS9. We will reduce the number of bit players that are ensigns or lieutenants and increase enlisted personnel in their place. How the hell does anything get done if everyone is an officer?!?

2. No godlike aliens. More powerful sure. Hugely more powerful’s fine. I’m above your petty little universe and can just alter the fundamental laws of the universe with my energy mind…no.

3. No time travel.

4. No holodeck gone wild. One exception - the story is good enough to rate the Captain ripping the godforsaken thing out as a safety hazard, never to be used in the rest of the series.

5. No parallel universe where seemingly the whole cast was both born and is alive.

6. No use of uniformed Nazis or near representations…just in case the writers try to use loopholes that don’t involve time travel.

7. No use of anyone from TNG in a cameo other than the DS9/O’Brien exception. Hey it’s my show.

[Grestarian]

I was a moderate fan of TOS, didn’t like TNG, and didn’t bother with reboot attempts after that. Nevertheless, I read all the posts here. I only have a bit of input about the one thing that irked me about the series and many of you have already discussed it:

The introductory monologue for TOS and TNG both emphasized that the crew’s 5-year mission was to “seek out new worlds, find new civilizations, split uncommon infinitives,” and – well, generally it was an exploratory vehicle in a galaxy that was unfamiliar to the crew members and that’s why the Federation was sending it out: Go scout the perimeter of what we already know and expand our knowledge base. As a couple others have already noted, the Age of Exploration set in Space theme is an awesome premise.

[This stated goal at the beginning of every episode avoided saying anything about whether other parts of the Federation were engaged in War, Turf War, Merchant Disputes, et cetera.]

So why the hell is a research vessel armed well enough to go face-to-face with a Klingon Battle Cruiser (K’Tinga Class, by the way) and WIN? For that matter, in The Ultimate Computer, it brutalized several other war vessels. Ridiculous!

I see nothing wrong with a research vessel having a few weapons – a scout should have some simple means of self-defense when it encounters a hostile entity during its search for unfamiliar worlds and civilizations. But having a research vessel beat a battle cruiser, a vessel designed and outfitted for war, is like having Bill Nye and Neil deGrasse Tyson strip down to shorts and step into the cage and WIN against Anderson “The Spider” Silva and Georges “Rush” St. Pierre. It just ain’t believable.

On the other hand, a good episode or two could be made about encountering a new world/civilization/species, finding out they’re hostile and too powerful for a scout ship’s defensive weapons, and all the stuff they try to do to stay alive until the Federation’s ‘cavalry’ can ride to the rescue.

In a similar vein as my original complaint, why is a research vessel burdened with the task of ferrying ambassadors to council sessions or sent out to beg for dilithium mining rights? There are enough stars and enough hypothetical Class M worlds in the Milky Way to fuel several seasons worth of unfamiliar worlds stories, not to mention encounters between star systems and follow-up visits to worlds that were discovered earlier*. And it’s one thing if Dr. Leaky radios out and says, “Hey, Dr. Fosse, I’ve run out of test serum for my garbolaise analyzer can you spare a few?” but if that happens in too many episodes, the stars of our show will end up being the FedEx (Federation Express) couriers rather than a research vessel on their own missions.

Lastly, the episode (Where No Man has Gone Before) and the movie (ST3?) which posited a physical barrier preventing egress from the galaxy (TV episode) or penetration of the galaxy’s center (ST3?) just seem ludicrous. Stop trying; it’s not like an egg were there’s some kind of membrane!

–G!
*Whatever happened to the Ekosians, the Magna-Romans, the Iotians, and the Eminiar/Vendikar civilizations?

[terentii]

Enough, already, with the incessant moralizing! If you have a point to make, fine, but make it subtly. And quit portraying the human race as more “advanced” and “evolved” than any other. We’re not, never have been, and never will be.

And, yes, for the love of all that’s good and decent, don’t put children on board starships. It’s just … plain … stupid!

[terentii]

@Grestarian

Lastly, the episode (Where No Man has Gone Before) and the movie (ST3?) which posited a physical barrier preventing egress from the galaxy (TV episode) or penetration of the galaxy’s center (ST3?) just seem ludicrous. Stop trying; it’s not like an egg were there’s some kind of membrane!

–G!
*Whatever happened to the Ekosians, the Magna-Romans, the Iotians, and the Eminiar/Vendikar civilizations?

ST V, the one directed by you-know-who. Actually, it’s quite possible that the core of the Galaxy is uninhabitable, due to intense radiation. I think Harlow Shapley was one of the astronomers who developed this theory.

Sam Peeples was the SF writer who came up with the outer Galactic Barrier, so he presumably was able to base it on something, but don’t ask me what.

With regard to the other civilizations, they will eventually be absorbed into the Federation, once they get their domestic problems sorted out (probably with the help of “advisors” supplied by the Feds).

And has been noted elsewhere, the *Enterprise *is performing the same tasks carried out by naval vessels (like the Beagle) 200–300 years ago. When there isn’t a war to fight in, they have to do all sorts of menial tasks in addition to exploration.

[Chronos]

A physical barrier at the edge of the Galaxy is absurd, but I’ve seen some good science fiction that posits that FTL drives don’t work (or at least, not without ludicrous amounts of energy) past the edge of the Galaxy. That would be a de facto barrier just as effective as any wall-- More so, in fact, since it’d continue to work even if you somehow ended up just on the other side of it.

[silenus]

@MrDibble

My new rules :

1. Fix warp at some multiple of c, and set that as a hard, universal limit for anything to travel. No transwarp, no instantaneous travel.
2. No faster-than-warp comms. If we’re replicating the Age of Exploration, then by damn the ships are going to be out of touch while on their missions, and their captains are going to have real power.
3. No more pandimensional all-powerful godlike beings like the Q, it’s old and boring. Take a leaf from B5, where even the almost godlike beings needed space ships.
   4) Set it on more than 1 ship with a similar mission - a friendly rivalry between crews, different captaining styles (A Vulcan captain would be cool), some cross-crew romances, alternate which ship is doing the mission-of-the-week, a season-long arc leading up to some sort of stand-together-or-hang-separately situation.
4. No time travel
5. A need for space/environment suits at least a few times a season.
6. One really alien crew member - alien CGI starfish, silicon lifeform in an encounter suit, insectoid Muppet, I don’t care, just one non-humanoid who *thinks *like a non-humanoid. NOT a shapeshifter, though.
7. Put it on a channel that allows near-nudity, alternative sexuality, light swearing, adult themes and violence. Like Killjoys-level SyFy adult, not HBO-level orgies, I mean.
8. Set up a system for how psi works, and stick to it.
9. no more monocultures.

Yes to everything but #4. That gets a OH FUCK NO! To understand why, read Ben Bova’s The Starcrossed.

Oh, and #8. The occasional “Game of Thrones” sex and gore-fest would be a nice change from all the noble questing for Knowledge.

[Raguleader]

With the comparison to Game of Thrones, I’m reminded of the joke about “Boldly Coming”…

[MrDibble]

@DrDeth

There’s a problem with this. That sort of Continuity means every writer has to know every episode that has aired, or that *will air *before their epi airs.

No, they merely need a showrunner (or assistant) who knows every episode, and has approval of new scripts. The writers themselves don’t need to know, they can be told if something in their new script conflicts.

[MrDibble]

@silenus

Yes to everything but #4. That gets a OH FUCK NO! To understand why, read Ben Bova’s The Starcrossed.

Why don’t *you *explain why, rather than point me at some book I have no interest in reading…

[zbuzz]

Jon Peters’ Star Trek:

1. I don’t want to see them in those uniforms
2. I don’t want to see them fly a starship
3. They have to fight a giant spider in the third act

[Raguleader]

Oh! Speaking of uniforms: Don’t have everyone just change uniforms between seasons, as if the Wardrobe department had simply been very busy during the off-season. Phase the old uniforms out, with the new ones getting phased in. Presumably the senior leadership would change first to set the standard and the junior officers would gradually switch over after a few episodes worth of griping.

Also: More dynamically chromatic space babes. Also some space hunks. It’s the 21st century, fanservice need not be so specific. I’m pretty sure we could get more interest in the fandom if we could draw in some ladies and alternately-focused guys with some Green-Skinned Space Chippendales.

[MrDibble]

If anime fandom is anything to go by, you’ll get more pull with bishōnen types than Chippendales.

[panache45]

Nobody named Wesley!

[terentii]

Wesley falls under the NO FREAKIN’ CHILDREN! category, but yeah, let’s create one just for him:

A WAY OF ELIMINATING WESLEY OR ANYONE LIKE HIM IS CONTRIVED BEFORE THE FIRST COMMERCIAL BREAK!

[terentii]

@MrDibble

Why don’t *you *explain why, rather than point me at some book I have no interest in reading…

This should save you the trouble…

The Starcrossed