Series about the Star Fleet Academy, why not?

I think a Starfleet Academy series could be good. And to those that say that it couldn't be interesting because of its location and premise, I think that the one of the problems with Star Trek is that almost all the stories are triggered by an outside element. It's as if the characters are only ever reacting to whats happening with them. For Starfleet Academy to work they would have to have a lot of character driven stories, and it would be the characters and the way they interact that would draw in viewers. You shouldn't rely on the premise alone to get people to watch.

As for the cast, it wouldn't be a problem to have a changing cast in my opinion, and I would have people in different stages of the Academy, so you don't end up getting an entirely new cast every four years. And you could have people return in later seasons as instructors, or just have them keeping in touch with the main characters. Just because it's an academy series, doesn't mean everyone has to be in the Academy.

 

I like the idea of Starfleet Academy as a series. I know I've posted before in previous discussions on this topic why. So I won't get into all that. I think it's a very viable idea.

However, I think it might be cooler to do it as an animated series instead of live-action.

 

I think the idea would probably be more acceptable as an animated show, because then the die-hards could ignore it if it went bad, but would still have the option to espouse it if it succeeded. (Not that the true die-hards don't pretend that certain canonical shows don't exist.)

 

Star Fleet Cadets are inherently annoying. This has already been well-proven by Wesley Crusher, Red Squad from DS9 etc. etc.

Everyone cheers when the Valiant Cadets die in the episode "Valiant".

A series about Star Fleet Academy would be equivalent to a new episode of "Valiant" every single week. That's why not.

Unless of course, they are gonna blow up the Cadet characters and replace the cast every week, which was the best part of "Valiant".

 

A Starfleet Academy series? I thought it had already been purposed and rejected. IMO I think this idea might work as a series of new novels linking all the TV series, novels and the movies into the history of the Trekiverse. There may even be enough material to start developing new games, even TV series spin-offs base on this series. Afterall we have over forty years of the Trekiverse to explore. I suggest we go for it. :thumbsup:

 

I think an academy series is too limited to survive.
The academy as a part of the new movie or in a few episodes of a new series that would be ok.

 

Well, I think the greatest single problem that an academt thing would have is that it would be percieved as "Harry Potter: In Space", and very few people would try it. And unless people try it, there's no audience.

The other problem is that there isn't a lot of things you can really DO at an academy. Once you've opened every "Chamber of Secrets" and had the place invaded several times, there isn't much more to do. Even with HP, it wouldn't work as a TV series unless you're going to pad it with 90210 stuff. Each HP movie covers a year. Streching a year to a season leaves a lot of empty space.

 

^
^^
Season 3 - episode 17; in which Kirk oversleeps for his midterm because his pre-occupation with the amount of attention Ruth is giving to "bad-boy" Finnegan is causing him to loose sleep. Cadet Kirk tries to go against his Boy Scout nature by trying to act more like the bad boy to garner more of Ruth's attention. Wackiness ensues.

 

Season 12, episode 22:

Kirk is visited by his 23rd uncle, who is a famous Harp-player. They recall visits from his other uncles: The ship captain, the governor, the supreme-court judge, the Olympic swimmer, the mad-scientist, the ship designer, the French wine-maker, the other mad scientist, etc.

 

I like the Academy idea. On the Trek shows we've usually seen officers at their peak, but rarely have we seen how they got there. I think a Starfleet Academy show can show us that.

By using a younger cast, it might broaden the viewership, and have a ready-made seasoned cast for spin-off movies. College is a very stressful, important time in a person's life. There is a lot of drama that can be mined from that. In addition to throwing in aliens, galatic politics, internships on ships or stations, various training/away missions that could go wrong, etc. and you have the potential for some action. Taking cues from Smallville-it's amazing how it has brought a new audience to the Superman franchise while contemporizing the mythos as well. An Academy series could do this for Trek.

Also, if you put it late 24th century, post-Dominion War, you can use a lot of TNG/VOY/DS9 cast members as guest stars, adjunct professors. In fact, it would be great if they could bring Colm Meaney on board since as a cast member O'Brien was supposed to be teaching at the university anyway.

There are a lot of shows that are based around one setting or location-think of all the successful hospital shows or show's based in one town or police precinct that manage to do well.

The key is creating an interesting, engaging group of characters. If they can do that, the Academy show can really work.

That being said, I think the idea would work better animated-a la Teen Titans, Legion of Superheroes style.

 

I think we all want to see "how they got there" but the problem is that most people tend to assume, or at least WANT TO BELIEVE, that these guys just were like we know them always.

One of the things about Trek that always bugged me was how the characters tended to stick alongside each other for... what, 40 years? Sure, this could work for Kirk, Spock, and McCoy... hell, I can even buy it for Scotty, though it's a stretch... but Sulu, Chekov, Uhura, etc, etc... they should have "moved on" to other assignments long before they ever did. And the idea that these people knew each other as kids is just silly. It's a BIG GALAXY... and believe it or not, you can make fast friends in real life without having grown up in the house next door to someone!

If you did a "how they got to be who they are" series... it would only reasonably be able to include one of the characters we know, unless you want to play into the "soap opera conceit" that the entire freakin' UNIVERSE consists of a dozen people. Even in a relatively "small" organization like any of the branches of the US military, when you get a new assignment you usually find yourself in among an entirely new group of people, with few if any prior acquaintances. I can't BELIEVE that Starfleet would be any different... and while "rank has its privileges," that would include mainly a commanding officer being able to REQUEST the assignment of one or two people to his new command. If someone requested all his "bestestest buddies" come with him, that would raise MAJOR "red flags" and the guy might end up losing his command over it!

 

People,

To the original poster and other supporters of a Starfleet Academy series: I think there are a number of inherent problems with the idea. Chief among them, the static locale of the Academy.

I think the closest we'll ever come to an Academy series is ST:TWOK, and the various eps in TNG and DSN featuring cadets.

I tend to agree that one way it could work better is as an animated series aimed at younger viewers. If it's set in the 24th century, some of the characters from the three series set in that time frame could make guest appearances -- hiring voice talent isn't as expensive, I believe, than hiring them for a live action series. Maybe Admiral Janeway as the academy commandant, and Tuvok and O'Brien as tough instructors.

A better idea would be a group of either recently graduated cadets or cadets on a special training assignment where they get credit for the experience and receive field promotions during their journey, like a cross between Red Squad and the young officers in the TNG ep "Lower Decks." In that setting, you avoide the sameness of the Academy campus as a background and can live up to the "boldly go where no one has gone before" credo of most of the series.

Just my two cents, folks.

Red Ranger

 

Well...so was DS9 and that is considered to generally be one of the best Trek shows.

Besides, who says that the entire series takes place at the academy? Perhaps as they get further into their studies, they will be assigned to Academy ships and go "out there."

 

In general, yes, but not exactly re: DSN. You had the wormhole, and travel to the Gamma Quadrant. Your point is well-taken re: the cadets eventually assigned to deep-space missions later on. -- RR

 

They should just take the 90210 scripts and futurize them for the trek universe. So basically just dump the words laser and space in front of things.

Lt. Dillon: Hey, ensign Walsh, you want to take the space bus to the laser prom?

Ensign Walsh: I dunno sir, I'm like... on my space period and I've got an exam in laser economics.

Lt. Dillon: Laser bummer.

 

Well, yeah, it has the potential to do that, but I've not seen very many successful TV drama shows that center around students at a university. The things I have seen are either quasi-soaps(BH90210), comedies (Saved By The Bell), monster shows (buffy),or movies (Harry Potter).

I think you'd end up with a lot of padding between not so interesting events, unless you had the students somehow be the only ones who could save the universe. Even if the Fed is at war, it's not like they're gonna stick a bunch of cadets on the front lines. So even war wouldn't change things much. That's the biggest problem -- very few good storylines, and a lot of padding.

I don't know that having ex-trek actors is going to be much of a draw. Nothing against them, but having a "very special" Star Trek Academy in which Riker talks about sex is creepy. To me.

Well, interesting things happen at a police station. Murders to be solved, pushers to be busted, prostitution rings, gang wars. That wouldn't happen at most schools, especially if it's a millitary academy. I don't care how sex-crazy young Kirk is -- he can't be a pimp at a millitary academy without getting thrown out. Stuff like DS9 or Law and Order work well because interesting stories come to those places. What's going to come to a millitary academy? Kirk studying for his biocemistry final isn't compelling drama, and I don't think they can have a lot of Potteresque secrets at SFA. Even at Hogwarts you don't have enough material to keep the story going for more than a year.

Characters are only half the story -- if nothing interesting happens, no one will watch.

 

[*] "Star Trek: Starfleet Academy"
"Genesis"

Earthdate: September 2378.

The story of four students in Theta Squad.

Despite the withdrawal of the Jem Hadar from Alliance territories, & the Vorta are visibly honoring their agreement to return to the Omarion Nebula.. the hysteria over possible remaining infiltrators in Starfleet hasn't completely subsided quite yet. Rumors are surfacing of possible collaborators....

Only a handful of people know anything about The Bluegill Parasites (from TNG's "Conspiracy",) and Species 8472's infiltration and former plans to invade Earth.

Admiral Leyton & his prodigies in Red Squad have all been expelled, arrested & charged. Or have they?

The Klingons & Cardassians (among others,) are doing their best to rebuild in the midst of Romulan/Vulcan political upheaval...

Life on Earth has attempted to get back to normal, however, there are still a variety of subdued sinister machinations going on behind closed doors. And realize this -- not all of those doors are on Earth...or in this time.

Starfleet Academy - Truth, Peace, Knowledge, Love, Sex, Loyalty, Honor, Opportunity, Career.

As Q once said "the trial isn't over."

 

One of the things that could be different about a Starfleet Academy series is how the stories on the show are constructed. One of my biggest problems with Star Trek is that it tend to follow a tired out formula of crew runs into something that causes the plot to begin. The characters on Star Trek are constantly reacting, they never actually take the initiative, and any conflicts that arise are immediately shuffled under the carpet by the time of the next episode.

For a Starfleet series to work, you would have to interesting, engaging characters who interact with each other. Most of the plot would be moved ahead by how the characters interact. Who likes who, who hates who. You can also involve a lot about these characters' (I would have completely new characters) families and life outside of Starfleet.

 

Agreed. That was what (once they started with it) I came to like about DS9. The design of the show was... unappealing (IMHO)... and the SFX sequences, while sometimes "cool" were unconvincing to me. Still, the ongoing story arc, the fact that things changed, people DIED, and that you knew that at the end of the show, things weren't going to go back to being "just like they were before"... that, I found REALLY appealing. It's the same thing that made me fall in love with Babylon 5. Now, this can be overdone, too... but without change and growth, characters and situations lose my interest quite rapidly these days.

A Trek story that involves change and growth and REAL RISK is what I think everyone wants. Not necessarily with a pre-plotted story arc, just with a production staff that's willing and able to take risks if the storytelling leads them there. The "everything is reset by the end of the episode" thing... it's not good enough for me anymore. My own life has changed so much over the years that I find myself looking at the "things must remain constant" storytelling convention as utterly unbelievable, so I just can't enjoy a storyline where that's the case.

I'd always hoped that they'd have left Spock dead. Not because I didn't like Spock (far from it) but because it would have forced change and growth. Bringing back Spock was a huge mistake, IMHO. Just imagine how things would have turned out if, instead of doing that, they'd left Kirk on the Enterprise with a few "old hands" (McCoy, Scotty, and Uhura), with occasional guest shots by Sulu and Chekov, off on their own ships. Uhura's role would have been much greater (possibly even 3rd in line for the center seat?). They'd have a new Executive officer and a new science officer, both of whom would have been "in the shadow of Spock." The new helmsman would be Saavik, but she, also, would be in that "shadow." The XO would be someone totally different from either Decker (at least as we saw him in TMP) or Riker (at least as how he started out TNG), as I see it. The science officer would not be a Vulcan at all (why not have it be Mr. Therin, from "Yesteryear?"). The new character opportunities would be boundless... and the storytelling options would be boundless as well.

And, had they done that, we might have eventually had Shatner get sick of it and leave, and the XO character (if he'd proven popular enough) might become the new captain. EVOLUTION rather than REVOLUTION... ya know?

Believable, natural change and growth... that's what Trek needs to keep MY interest. Not rehashing of the "same old thing" over and over. And also, especially, not attempts to pretend that the old characters are "reborn" in new kid-bodies.

If I can't suspend my disbelief, I'd rather not see it at all.

 

You almost had me, until the time travel stuff.

Nothing personal, but I'm tired of trek and time travel.