I'm not a fan, personally, of prequels.
I find the idea flawed: "Here's the backstory of the universe you already know".
Tthere's some mileage in that idea, of course. But by it's very nature, you're not going to get something dynamic out of exploring parts of the mythology that are already known, or if you *do* make something dynamic out of it then it'll just piss off the long term fans who hate how you're messing up all the continuity.
(See also Star Wars I, II and III).
The other problem with Enterprise, and this was at it's very original conception, was the hubris of the established creative team. They assumed that, being Star Trek, it would be a guaranteed seven year run with lots of opportunities to fix things up later (which they almost never get around to, as Voyager demonstrated).
This is what I mean when I say Berman and Braga were on auto-pilot. When they suddenly realised that they might not get seven years after all, that was the figurative kick up the ass they needed to get them out of their ennui and actually making something interesting again.
The third and fourth seasons were probably 60% of the way towards that change of thinking.
I'm not going to sit here and claim it was perfect by any means, but it was an indication that somebody behind the scenes was finally starting to shift gears in terms of their thinking. Whether that would have ultimately resulted in something better or something worse in a hypothetical fifth season is a matter of conjecture.
I find the idea flawed: "Here's the backstory of the universe you already know".
Tthere's some mileage in that idea, of course. But by it's very nature, you're not going to get something dynamic out of exploring parts of the mythology that are already known, or if you *do* make something dynamic out of it then it'll just piss off the long term fans who hate how you're messing up all the continuity.
(See also Star Wars I, II and III).
The other problem with Enterprise, and this was at it's very original conception, was the hubris of the established creative team. They assumed that, being Star Trek, it would be a guaranteed seven year run with lots of opportunities to fix things up later (which they almost never get around to, as Voyager demonstrated).
This is what I mean when I say Berman and Braga were on auto-pilot. When they suddenly realised that they might not get seven years after all, that was the figurative kick up the ass they needed to get them out of their ennui and actually making something interesting again.
The third and fourth seasons were probably 60% of the way towards that change of thinking.
I'm not going to sit here and claim it was perfect by any means, but it was an indication that somebody behind the scenes was finally starting to shift gears in terms of their thinking. Whether that would have ultimately resulted in something better or something worse in a hypothetical fifth season is a matter of conjecture.
), George Lucas says how he liked the idea of writing this as a universe with a bit of unseen history, and how it enhances the storytelling, and enriches the overall mythology, by the very fact that all of the backstory is "told" rather than "shown". One wonders, then, what he honestly thought could be gained by actually going backwards and showing that backstory. I really think Star Wars suffers as a 'Saga' because of that kind of muddled thinking. The original trilogy still stands up well on it's own, and the prequel trilogy likewise stands up on it's own in a lot of ways, but couple them together and you only end up with headaches.
