Baggage you wish Star Trek could be free of?

[Tim Walker]

Even with white people there could be more diversity.

Picard was supposed to be French, but somehow he came across as British.

 

[Kilana2]

I remember, while re-reading one of the first Titan novels, one character observing that aboard Titan key personnel are still human despite the diversity among the crew. So it would be nice to see more non-human admirals, captains and execs. In fact, I´d like to see more Hermats or Tamarians for instance.

 

[Christopher]

Even with white people there could be more diversity.

Picard was supposed to be French, but somehow he came across as British.

No reason he couldn't have gone to school in England and picked up the accent and culture there. After all, in an age of transporters and flying cars, it would've been extremely easy to commute between England and France.

But yes, Federation culture was basically American culture through and through, with baseball and root beer and Westerns and all that. It would be cool to get some real diversity -- and not the fake stuff like Chakotay's invented Indian culture.

 

[Autistoid]

But they're fantasy abilities, not science fiction.

Because psychic powers are the only thing in Star Trek that's more fantasy than science .

I don't think you're getting into the spirit of this thread. It's not about evaluating the version of Star Trek that we have, it's about asking what each of us would set aside if we were given the opportunity to reinvent it from scratch. It would be a pretty boring thread if we didn't each have different ideas about how to do that. So those differences of opinion are not something to roll our eyes at, they're something to welcome.

Very much agreed this isn't a why you hate star trek thread.

We all know things were done in the past that didn't need to be done, as was said due to historic or economic reasons.

This is a wishlist of things that could of been avoided.


As I said Transporters and Holodecks are in themselves not issues, it's the implications of those technologies.

 

[Autistoid]

I know it's classic Trek, but I'm wary/weary of cosmic entities with otherworldly powers. Spaceborne lifeforms like Junior are cool, but others like Q really should be operating on a level that's incomprehensible by any means to the audience, or are just vague enough that magic applies (and even those entities are rather cryptic about their abilities, again despite the sci-fi aspects of the show).

I'm always conflicted by these supreme being types.

On the one hand I think they actually more sense in star trek.

One of my issues with later series is the idea that federation tech is a generation away from being the most advanced in the galaxy/ever.

In canon intelligent life has been around for an exceptionally long time.

The logical conclusion is that either technology has a definitely limit that the borg are approaching, or more likely life advances in a different direction going forward.

 

[Captain Clark Terrell]

I remember, while re-reading one of the first Titan novels, one character observing that aboard Titan key personnel are still human despite the diversity among the crew. So it would be nice to see more non-human admirals, captains and execs. In fact, I´d like to see more Hermats or Tamarians for instance.

I'd like to see a series featuring a lead character who's not human. Every other series lead has been human, although several of the number-two characters (Spock, Data, Kira and T'Pol) weren't human (or weren't only human, in Spock's case).

Series featuring characters like Donatra (Dina Meyer) or Shran (Jeffrey Combs) would be interesting--not necessarily those characters, but characters like them played by talented actors.

Edit: Speaking of Romulans, I much preferred their TOS appearance as opposed to TNG and beyond (the forehead V-ridge). The Vulcans that traveled to Romulus would not have had enough time to develop the ridges, as only two-thousand years had passed by the time the Romulans became a player in galactic affairs. I know the writers wanted to avoid confusing the audience, but the inclusion of the ridge never made sense, IMO.

--Sran

 

[T'Girl]

... I'd have it re-written so that they are in fact human colonies, possibly separated from the Federation or whatever.

Speaking of colonies (and separated/lost colonies), I wouldn't have placed TOS in the 23rd century, but instead three or four centuries later. This would given more time for Human expansion into the galaxy and provided more room for historical backstory.

TNG and etc would be slid forward in time as well.

 

[Tim Walker]

The Holodeck was one of things that could be good in limited doses.

For example, Captain Proton had an interesting premise-an old fashioned space opera within the context of a modern space opera. One of those ideas that was good for a single episode.

 

[2takesfrakes]

For me, more than anything, the "baggage" I wish STAR TREK were free of was this total embarassment of the look of The Classic Series. So much so that every future incarnation actively rejected every aspect of it, when I feel that certain design elements should've become the standard "look." Like the pools of coloured light with the curious shadows everywhere that seemed unrelated to anything else in the room. Even in sickbay, especially if there were some drama set there. I would not have continued the sort of boxy interior Enterprise design, or the backlit gumdrops peppering every instrument, per se. But the use of colour continues to give TOS an otherworldly appearance, because it's so rarely used like that outside of clubs or whathaveyou. I love the reboot movies, so far, and the look of them. But everything dates, eventually, which is why I would've liked to have seen alot more carrying over than what eventually did, to give it all a singular sense of style.

 

[Christopher]

Edit: Speaking of Romulans, I much preferred their TOS appearance as opposed to TNG and beyond (the forehead V-ridge). The Vulcans that traveled to Romulus would not have had enough time to develop the ridges, as only two-thousand years had passed by the time the Romulans became a player in galactic affairs. I know the writers wanted to avoid confusing the audience, but the inclusion of the ridge never made sense, IMO.

Unless they genetically engineered themselves that way for some reason -- another concept that would get a lot more play in an updated Trek based on modern SF ideas.

Or maybe there was a native Vulcan race that had more prominent foreheads, and the vast majority of them left in the Sundering, and any who remained either died out or interbred with other Vulcans sufficiently for their pronounced foreheads to become exceedingly rare on Vulcan.

But yeah, changing the Romulan makeup was always a bit odd. I think it was more about taking advantage of more advanced makeup technology than it was about not confusing the audience, since we saw Vulcans so rarely in TNG.

 

[Captain Clark Terrell]

^It's possible.I've also read that the ridge is a type of keloid that developed as a result of Romulan warriors scarring themselves as part of an ancient ritual. That doesn't explain how the ridges appeared on young children--unless the early Romulans elected to perform genetic engineering in order to introduce the ridge throughout their society as you suggested.

--Sran

 

[Autistoid]

Instead of constantly running into aliens of the week who are identical to humans or nearly identical to humans just with bumps on the forehead, I'd have it re-written so that they are in fact human colonies, possibly separated from the Federation or whatever.

Even transplanted humans would be more plausible than the bumpy-headed alien of the week.

Which was so over done that it is now tedious.

It's established that all humanoid life are relatively close in their relations, due to some panspermia-ancient alien ancestry.

Granted I do think more exploration of this idea should be shown in the next series.

 

[Autistoid]

No reason he couldn't have gone to school in England and picked up the accent and culture there. After all, in an age of transporters and flying cars, it would've been extremely easy to commute between England and France.

No reason he has to have a british accent when the show is dubbed in french.

No offense but the idea that these people are all overly american is very exaggerated.

The simple fact that everyone lives in a show that is essentially communist shows this.

Racially is a different story, however if the series was produced in japan/india/nigeria I wouldn't except to cast a whole bunch of foreigners just to maintain a racial quota.

That being said I would enjoy the show more if it was infact more multicultural. However its tricky to convey that in a show where earth is a utopian unified society.

Enterprise is probably the most guilty of this.

It was set in a time when we were less unified and more diverse as a planet, and yet it took americana way way to far.

 

[Autistoid]

... I'd have it re-written so that they are in fact human colonies, possibly separated from the Federation or whatever.

Speaking of colonies (and separated/lost colonies), I wouldn't have placed TOS in the 23rd century, but instead three or four centuries later. This would given more time for Human expansion into the galaxy and provided more room for historical backstory.

TNG and etc would be slid forward in time as well.

Yeah I think that was the original idea.

 

[Christopher]

The simple fact that everyone lives in a show that is essentially communist shows this.

I keep hearing that, but nobody who actually understood what communism means could think that. Communism is not just a moneyless society. Communism is, in theory, an anarchic system in which the members of a society govern themselves and their neighbors on an individual level and own and manage all means of production themselves. (So-called "communist" nations are actually socialist dictatorships theoretically working to create an eventual stateless communist society, but they never actually achieve it, because the fatal flaw in Marxist theory is the faith that an all-powerful state could ever be trusted to work toward its own dissolution.) The Federation is a representative democracy with a president, a council, commissioners, a fully functioning government of the sort that would not exist in a truly communist state.

Also, it wasn't until TNG that the idea of a moneyless Federation was embraced. TOS was full of references to money and capitalism, and though The Voyage Home introduced the "no money in the 23rd century" idea, it probably just meant no paper money for leaving tips at restaurants. So there was nothing remotely "communist" about the original series.

I mean, come on, think about it. The idea that any television series on a commercial television network in the United States in the 1960s or 1980s, both eras in which the Cold War was rather heated, would be able to get away with advocating a communist society is preposterous. On TV shows in both eras, the Commies were always the bad guys.

By the way, here's the Star Trek Script Search results page for the word "communist" in transcripts of all six series and all ten original-universe movies. The only times it was used were in TOS: "The Omega Glory" in reference to the Kohms (who were the villains of the episode) and in ENT: "Storm Front" to refer to the altered history in which Lenin was assassinated in 1916 and Russia never became communist. There are zero hits for "communism" or "socialism" in any Trek series or movie, and the only hit for "socialist" is in the phrase "National Socialist Party" in TOS: "Patterns of Force" (again, the bad guys -- although the Nazis were neither nationalist nor socialist, they just used those labels because they were popular ideas in Germany at the time).

Racially is a different story, however if the series was produced in japan/india/nigeria I wouldn't except to cast a whole bunch of foreigners just to maintain a racial quota.

Nonwhite does not equal "foreigner." Indeed, the population of Los Angeles is only 41% white, and only 29% non-Hispanic white. So real-life actor demographics don't justify the majority-white casts of the Trek shows. Especially considering how many Trek regulars did come from other countries -- Patrick Stewart, Marina Sirtis, Colm Meaney, Alexander Siddig, Dominic Keating, Karl Urban, Simon Pegg, John Cho (born in South Korea), Anton Yelchin (born in Russia). Plus William Shatner and James Doohan, both from Canada.

 

[Tim Walker]

With Serenity/Firefly you got an impression of what a cosmopolitan city/colony could look like.

There was even a bit of a cosmopolitan atmosphere in Pitch Black.

 

[T'Girl]

Something else I'd drop would be the Federation government being on Earth, maybe relocate Starfleet command as well.

Keep the academy in San Fransisco, and the orbital shipyard where the Enterprise was built.

 

[Nightdiamond]

The bland background music that supposed to tell you what to feel.

Giving us a preview of next week's episode at the end of the current episode.



Re: ESP : There might be at least some real life evidence for ESP or PSI. They did a weird experiment at a Grateful Dead concert that involved the crowd mentally sending images of paintings to two sleeping volunteers miles away.

The Vulcan mind meld was cool, when it appeared like some advanced Vulcan mind science/technique. That mind thing that Khan did was kind of interesting.

But they went way too far with it. As if for some reason, being in space or the 23rd-24th century makes ESP super real, after centuries of no strong evidence.

With Deanna Troi, you'd have to believe she can sense a person's emotions in ship over a mile away-- over a view screen. Sure.

 

[Captain Clark Terrell]

^I'd actually take things a step further and have the main Academy campus in SF but also have satellite campuses throughout Federation space (to give cadets on specific career tracks different options for their training).

I like the idea of having Starfleet HQ elsewhere; strategically, it's a bad idea to have Starfleet most important installations (headquarters, school, President's office, etc.) all on the same planet.

I suppose it's possible that Starfleet has several alternate sites picked out in case the primary headquarters is damaged or destroyed (as in the Breen attack), but it would make sense to actually see or hear about them so that we know they actually exist.

--Sran

 

[TRON JA307020]

There's a ton of baggage I'd like to see discarded if Trek were rebooted from scratch, all the stuff rooted in the '60s origins of the show and the earlier pulps that influenced it. The human-centrism, the predominance of characters from Western cultures with names of mostly British or Irish origin, the abundance of humanoid and human-appearing aliens, the lack of genetic engineering and transhumanism, the rarity of sentient or superintelligent AIs, the lack of advanced materials and molecular engineering, the inclusion of psi powers, etc. I'd also ditch the tendency to create new random aliens-of-the-week that are never seen again, and instead put more effort into developing a more limited pool of races and building a more cohesive picture of the Federation's members and neighbors.

Oh, and a more coherent treatment of sensors. No more treating them as something separate from visual observation (e.g. "We can see it but sensors don't register it"); surely sensors would include telescopes. Anything in the open on a planet surface could be directly, visually observed from orbit, as spy satellites can do today. No "sensor interference" would prevent that unless it were actual opaque clouds or something. Also, "sensor range" should be effectively limitless, allowing only for resolution and lightspeed lag; there are no horizons in space. Eventually, powerful enough telescopes should let us image and map alien worlds from parsecs away, so no more stories where the characters know nothing about a star system until they reach it. (And no more falling out of orbit when the engines go off. The Moon doesn't need engines. Orbit isn't powered flight.)

Holodecks were a late add on, and seem to make little sense relative to what we now understand as a more likely version of VR.

I'm not so sure about that anymore. I've read that there are some fundamental limitations to something like VR goggles or the Oculus Rift or the like, since our eyes are always going to focus differently on a close-up image than a distant one, so a close-up image pretending to be distant is always going to confuse the brain. Also there's the time lag between when we turn our heads and when the VR updates the image to follow, which can be made smaller but not eliminated entirely. So that kind of VR may never be perfectly convincing or comfortable, and could cause motion sickness or the like for some people. The same could conceivably go for direct sensory induction, since there's going to be a difference between what you're made to see/feel and what your body actually senses about its environment. So that would only work if your perception of reality were completely suppressed and overridden by the illusion, and that could be potentially hazardous.

So it might be that, once the technology is available, something like a holodeck would be a better, more convincing alternative than the kinds of VR you usually see in fiction.

Transporters on the other hand are much more an issue of production. Obviously craft launches and landings would of been too expensive without, however at this point seems to be a needless part of the show.

EDIT: Be
clear I'm not completely against transporters I just think they have been over used, and often get in the way of more interesting possibilities.

If I did keep transporters, I'd ditch the dematerialization angle and make them wormhole-based. That would be simpler, more plausible (to a degree), and closer to how they're generally depicted as working anyway.

I wholeheartedly agree about the human looking aliens. TOS did it a lot to the point where human looking aliens looked exactly human. At least TNG and the other series put a bump or line on the human looking aliens(That got tiring also). IF they would have rebooted ST from scratch they could have remedied the problem.