WI: Enterprise had season four quality, in season 1?

[BlackWave]

I read once (on tvtropes) that this was originaly the intro music but was replaced for some obscure reason.

http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=X8vslSWlsEg

It is a lot better (although I still prefer all the other intro themes).

Anyway, as this threat turned into How would you change enterprise hoping it would be better, I'll post with my proposed changes.

First I would change the starting date for enterprise from 2151 to 2154. This might seem a trivial change, but there is a reason for it. the Federation was founded in 2161. If you assume a Star Trek series is usualy 7 years. You can have the founding of the Federation in the final episode, which seems like a good ending. As is obvious from this the theme for the series would be the founding of the Federation and not the first steps of humanity in deep space. For such a series you realy need to set the series earlier in for example 2100-2110 (first contact was in 2063 and 50 years after first contact and 50 years before joining a interstellar/interspecial Federation seem a more reasonable timeframe for such a show).

Next i would change the setting drastically. As I said the major theme would be the founding of the Federation. If you form a single nation with a group of people, it seems reasonable that you already know them for a while and relatively well. So earth already knows and have extensive contacts with not only the Vulcans, but also the Andorians and Tellerites. The relationship between these species is not openly hostile (they will form a single nation in 7 years after all), but there are of course differences in opinion. Part of the first three seasons will be the Enterprise trying to ease possible rising tensions between these species.

Other important storylines of the first couple of seasons will be first contact with a couple of major star trek species (like Bolians, Betazoid, perhaps Orions, Nausicans or those gold dwarves). There will be no appearance of Borg, Dominion, Ferengi or any other species that were contacted first in next gen era Star Trek (or TOS era for that matter). Other major storylines could be the Enterprise helping with setting up new Space Colonies for Earth. But a major plotline would be the Klingons. First episode of the series First Contact with the Klingons which ends up disasterous. This leads to major conflicts with the Klingons, but never outright war.

Those are the first couple of seasons. Then around season 4 the Romulans turn up and the Erth-Romulan war starts. The Romulans are behind any tension that was rising between Earth, Vulcans, Andorians and Tellerites. So they must form a united front against the Romulans. Part of these seasons are Easrth fighting the Romulans and losing. The other species are also bothered by the Romulans and they slowly start to realise they must form an alliance. All this ends in a victory for the coalition and the four species deciding to form a federation.

the crew of the Enterprise will be different. My major complaint was that the crew was too American. Earth is earth, not just America. TOS, TNG and DS9 were able to form a rather international crew, so Enterprise can do that too. The captain can be an American for all i care, but the rest of his crew (with possibly one exception or so) are from all over the world. Furthermore, it doesn't make sense to have a Vulcan aboard that is a full part of the crew, so he or she will be merely an observer, not the second in command. At a later stage an Andorian and Tellerite observer will appear (although perhaps just as regulars, not as a main character).

So those are my ideas.

That is pretty much what I have already done here.

 

[pompejus]

That is pretty much what I have already done here.

It is sad how easy you can turn both Voyager as Enterprise in better series while still keeping the premise the same.

 

[Generaloberst]

That is pretty much what I have already done here.

I was looking for somewhere where all the threads were!

 

[Mike Stearns]

Year from Hell was a good story that failed to be a great episode do to the reset at the end and no one remembering anything.
Agree that both SGU and Battlestar were closer to the goal of what Voyager wanted to be but never attempted to get there.

Well, I reference Year of Hell, because of the astounding amount of punishment that Voyager takes in that episode. What Voyager looked like at the end of Year of Hell, is what Voyager should have looked like at the end of the series, as a ship that's literally had the living shit beat out of it for seven years.

 

[Jack Hawksmoor]

It would appear that if you mention Star Trek three times BlackWave appears and posts links to his ReImagining.


It is very easy to fix Voyager - the premise and set up was never followed. A lone ship on the other side of galaxy, alone and in unfamiliar territory, undermanned and forced to integrate crew of the ship it was hunting and forced to make compromises at each turn while struggling not to stray away from the basic idealism.

It was unclear what exactly was to be setup of Enterprise - it was set too early before the Romulan war and according to original ideas it would originally take a season to get the ship ready for launch. The brain trust behind was Brennan and Braga as they alienated the surviving TNG collaborators. And they went with the existing prequel trend without any long term planning. Even Voyager had a more planned out setup even if showrunners barely followed it.

Enterprise could have worked if it was focused from the beginning on the idea of cooperation, friendship and alliance building in order to achieve security and prosperity. As a premise Enterprise would have this - United Earth is finally becoming a regional power, but it is uncertain how to approach galactic politics? Wary of the unknown? Isolate itself? Deal decisively with potential threats? Seek understanding with others? Intervene in affairs of others or pursue only its own interests? That is plenty of material along with canon topics of Romulan War and Federation.

Those themes would actually be very topical given the time Enterprise started (2001-), and it would work well as allusions to real world issues without launching into a pointless Xindi terror attack plot.

You could have had episode arc where United Earth has to deal with backfire from involvement in civil war on another planet leading to that race adopting a hostile stance towards Earth and ultimately offering base to raiders (guess what that would reference in real world). This would work as a prequel to establishing a prime directive instead of that atrocious genocidal episode Enterprise did.

Romulan war could have been handled differently - perhaps add the intrigue of possible preemptive attack and its justification by Earth (again, topical for the audience and timeframe) after rising tensions.

You could have had another future member race be antagonistic to Earth - Betazoids or Trill for example. Betazoid would work well as they only need contact lenses to appear human and with their telepathic powers they are perfect infiltrators and suited to work alone. Why waste CGI on Suliban? One theme of Federation is that it managed to ultimately win over or reach an understanding with its enemies - from TOS to TNG/DS9 Klingons become allies - why not have the same thing happen from Enterprise to TOS timeframe?

Instead of having Enterprise being a flagship or torch bearer ship from the start make it a second tier ship whose crew is compromised of mismatched individuals from around the Earth. Partially as a half forgotten bureaucratic experiment and part as a dumping ground for outcast officers (and later exchange officers). Of course, through hardship and enterprise they learn to function well as team, appreciating diversity and eventually becoming the hallmark for future Starfleet.

Earth has to build a coalition to defend itself and it the aftermath it sees an opportunity to spread its idealism into stars - turning alliance into federation. Enterprise to build a better world.

Explore Tellarites and Andorians - they are potentially hostile, but behind their cultural uniqueness (arguing, passion) they believe in the same things. Their appearance should not be an issue - ST:E Andorians looked less silly than those shown in TOS or TNG and you could have done the same to Tellarites. Appearances of Cardassians, Bajorans and Trill changed more (Trill) or less (Bajorans, Cardassians) between TNG and DS9 so what? Reinforce the core theme of seeking common ideals and cooperation with strange new worlds. Andorian wedding customs could for serve as surrogate for LGBT rights theme.

Have a story arc about Coridan, a resource rich planet where opposing factions are backed by foreign powers and explore morality of supporting the most stable regime even if it is not the best for their people.

Enterprise has to convince an alien civilization that their planet will suffer catastrophic changes within a decade but they refuse to believe it, considering it to be a hoax perpetrated by alien cabal.

There are many hints in canon Enterprise could have built on without getting tangled in continuity or bringing Ferengi, Borg or holograms into 22nd century.

The best Star Trek episodes from any series are those concerned with ideals and values or its subversions (A Taste of Armageddon, Drumhead, In the Pale Moonlight, The Measure of a Man) - I don't recall any from Enterprise except Archer and Phlox leaving an entire race to die out. To be fair Voyager did those poorly - Tuvix ended with unwarranted execution without any consequences.

Kirk basically went around bedding alien women and bringing down unfair societies - I am sure the Enterprise could have done the same, but with far less guidelines, firepower or justification and exploring the moral gravitas more making it more mature and deconstruction the traditional formulaic episodes of Trek. See the fallout of quick and forceful solutions to problems or uninformed meddling.

It might have found a niche as a counterbalance to rising trend of edgy and antihero protagonists. First several seasons would wrestle with moral dilemmas and growing security tensions, then lead into Romulan war season 3 or 4 (2004 or 2005) and the costs of protracted struggle and eventually led into foundation of federation (season 7, 2008), ending on the highest note possible. Romulan war would happen around the time Stargate tied up its main Goauld plot and its lackluster 8th season possibly even dooming or drastically altering Stargate: Atlantis (Atlantis decides to follow trend of Enterprise and decides to build a quasifederation in the Pegasus galaxy).

Critics could claim that its final season foreshadowed the rise of Obama with its themes of hope (foundation of federation) and criticized the conduct of War on Terror which would give Enterprise cultural impact. Even STID had a moral issue as its centerpiece even if run by a man who misunderstands classic trek.

Although in reality, I doubt Star Trek could find any showrunners willing to thread such a line and resist the pressure to produce a new TNG - the TV climate had changed too much to rethread classical science fiction. This led to paradoxical quest to distance Enterprise from the Star Trek stereotypes while borrowing unnecessary elements from TNG and adding new inventions like Denobulans and Xindi which had no unique role other races could not fulfill already.

 

[Blackfox5]

Instead of a prequel, which always represents all sort of continuity bombs unless it is a single writer who controls the entire series (which was impossible for Star Trek which had a bajillion TV shows, movies, books, cartoons and comics), a fresh start would have been a series set 30-40 years in the future after the last series.

It provides a clean slate, but doesn't present any continuity programs. It allows the producers to take the most popular elements of the previous shows and start fresh. It wouldn't require any previous knowledge of the past shows because everything would be introduced brand new. People might certainly know there are Borg, Cardassians, Romulans, whatever, but they wouldn't know what they would be like 30 years from now. So you'd need to reintroduce them, and by doing so you'd let new viewers learn about them.

By the end of the TNG era, there are many things about the setting which made it very different when it began. You had the Dominion War which was the first large scale galactic war. You had the invasion of the Borg. You had several great powers greatly weakened or wiped out. The Federation had expanded to include all sorts of new aliens. Rather than deal with the complicated continuity, far better to jump ahead and reset things to a new status quo that allows viewers to discover things again.

 

[BlackWave]

Instead of a prequel, which always represents all sort of continuity bombs unless it is a single writer who controls the entire series (which was impossible for Star Trek which had a bajillion TV shows, movies, books, cartoons and comics), a fresh start would have been a series set 30-40 years in the future after the last series.

It provides a clean slate, but doesn't present any continuity programs. It allows the producers to take the most popular elements of the previous shows and start fresh. It wouldn't require any previous knowledge of the past shows because everything would be introduced brand new. People might certainly know there are Borg, Cardassians, Romulans, whatever, but they wouldn't know what they would be like 30 years from now. So you'd need to reintroduce them, and by doing so you'd let new viewers learn about them.

By the end of the TNG era, there are many things about the setting which made it very different when it began. You had the Dominion War which was the first large scale galactic war. You had the invasion of the Borg. You had several great powers greatly weakened or wiped out. The Federation had expanded to include all sorts of new aliens. Rather than deal with the complicated continuity, far better to jump ahead and reset things to a new status quo that allows viewers to discover things again.

They've already sort of done this with Star Trek Online (which is kinda pseudo-canon until someone changes their mind) and the DS9 Relaunch novels stuff.

 

[Ming777]

Well, the STO storyline is actually fascinating, with so stuff happening behind the scenes...

 

[Mike Stearns]

Instead of a prequel, which always represents all sort of continuity bombs unless it is a single writer who controls the entire series (which was impossible for Star Trek which had a bajillion TV shows, movies, books, cartoons and comics), a fresh start would have been a series set 30-40 years in the future after the last series.

I disagree. I don't think a Star Trek prequel was impossible. The concept of building a show around the the birth of the Federation was a fantastic idea, the problem was that to execute Enterprise well required a coherent, pre-planned story, which had never been done before on Star Trek. Failing that, you need showrunners who understand that in order to keep Trek vibrant, each iteration of the franchise needs to be distinct. You need people willing to try something along the lines of Caprica, for example, or The West Wing.

 

[phx1138]

Because at some point prior to the start of Voyager Chakotay had resigned his commission and joined the Maquis.

Which changes nothing, since he's been Maquis captain, & has seniority over *Janeway anyhow.

Remember that Tuvok was a Federation plant within the Maquis organization, so presumably he can intervene as popular sentiment is starting to crystallize around Chakotay instead of Janeway.

Which he'd only do if *Janeway is the senior & clearly the better choice. TTL, neither is true.

One more thought: have you ever considered that the initial setup for Voyager -- a single ship, alone in an uncharted quadrant of the galaxy with no way to get home that is vastly more powerful than anything else in the area -- is very much the same premise as Island in the Sea of Time or 1632?

It seems to me that you would have had a very interesting show if the crews of Voyager had followed that path: "okay, there's no way we're getting home, let's not tilt at windmills and let's start a new Federation here in the Delta quadrant." Heck, I'd watch that now.

So long as they've got warp drive, "no way home" isn't true. Also, Starfleet has been made out pretty dauntless, so deciding to stay seems improbable. (That's leaving aside the contact with the "37s", absurd as it was as a story, where I'd have expected at least one anthropologist to stay behind & study how a human culture might evolve differently.)

Instead of a prequel, which always represents all sort of continuity bombs

Why? So long as you don't contradict canon, there's a lot of room to introduce elements "TOS" & "TNG" never showed. Like, frex, other actual Starfleet ships. Like pre-Fed conflicts. Like Fed members never seen in "TOS" or "TNG".

What bugged me most about Season 4 was the first contacts with species introduced in "TOS" as first contacts. If they actually weren't, were Kirk & The Gang stupid?

I don't think "hitting the reset button" as a trope necessarily diminishes the quality of a story

Not if it's done well. The trouble arises when it's a crutch because the writers can't come up with anything else. Worse still when they do a story that should produce drastic changes, & doesn't: after the Pegasus story, Riker should've been busted, but came back like it never happened.

As said already, IMO the producers of "ST:E" wanted "TOS Light" (or a "'TOS' reboot"), but failed to realized the in-universe changes that made it impossible.

Neither am I thrilled with the rebooted "ST".