This is the kind of story that science fiction has been telling for decades. In books. Not everything translates well to movies or TV.
Am I the only one wanting a reboot that is a harder sci fi?
- Thread starter SalyutBuran
- Start date
This is the kind of story that science fiction has been telling for decades. In books. Not everything translates well to movies or TV.
Continuity Reboot. Not a partial-reboot like the 2009 Film or a visual-reboot like DSC.
But what? Do you have examples?
Something like having more non-humanoid robots and drones on the ships (that's not necessarily harder scifi, just implementing something they didn't have budget for previously)
Drones would definitely be a place I would not mind seeing expanded upon. Greater variety in the planets of the week. Just looking to the real world for inspiration.
HBO has the complete series.
None of which has anything to do with hard or soft SciFi though.
Not where I live
Yes and no. Incorporating contemporary understanding of technology in to Star Trek would be a nice way to connect it in, ground it a little bit, and make it a little bit more of a harder SF, or some ideas more grounded. Hard/soft SF is a continuum, not a strict rule set. Star Trek is primarily soft, but has attempted to work in some more grounded elements.
The Green Lantern Corps played around with this, as one of the beings they encountered was Rot Lop Fan. His species lives in a very deep, utterly lightless part of space where they had evolved precise hearing at the expense of losing vision since it was unnecessary. Since he did not see as many species do, Rot had no conception of color (green) or light (lantern). He instead was encourage to base his powers around sound instead, referring to the GLC as the "F-Sharp" Corps and using a power ring that modified itself into a bell form.
Just when I don't want to get back in to comics they do stuff like that and try and make it interesting....
Created by Alan Moore no less, way back in 1987.
It wouldn't replace anything.
Then I suppose I misunderstand the question. Op asked if other people would like to see a Star Trek reboot set in a hard scifi setting. By reboot, I assumed they meant ‘full overhaul’. If reboot just means, a ‘version of’, then, like I said in my first post, it could be a fun idea.
I think a version of was my idea. I believe strongly in multiple interpretations of Trek.
Yeah fans get half a dozen concurrent versions of Batman and don't blink. Soon, a movie will come out with 2 of them in it, and it'll be followed by a reboot with an entirely different tone and all-new cast. One of those Batmen fought space aliens, another weirdo mutant crazies and freaks and the newest one a serial killer on Earth. Let Trek have loads of different Kirks and Spocks, and let some exist in more grounded universes than others.
It may be possible to tweak Trek around the edges, moving Trek marginally towards hard. Into Darkness showed a bit of this, with heads up displays in the suit helmets, and showing the use of attitude control thrusters. And keeping the technology in the background unless it was specifically important to the plot.
(And there would be improvement if 90% of the technobabble was dumped).
However, Trek is more a vehicle for the imagination than a rigorous extrapolation of science and technology.
I always thought TMP was the closest they came to hard sci fi and maybe that's why it's my favourite portrayal of the Enterprise. The ship feels like a high tech submarine in space. The technology has its limits. There are power consumption issues. They build the ship in space and I can't imagine it performing hairpin turns magically over a group of of worshipping primitives. I would have been happy to see a big budget Phase II series after that.
I’d be up for a modern re-imagining to be honest. Take the basic DNA of the original series (characters, premise, core design elements) and do everything else from scratch with what we know now in 2021.
I’ve said a couple of times that I think you could do a TOS re-imagine if you set it in like the 27th century. The backstory would be that in the 23rd through 25th centuries, man discovered ftl travel and various cultures launched deep space colonization efforts across the galaxy. There was some sort of “event” that distracted mankind over the intervening 250 years, halting that process and causing most of those colonies to be lost or forgotten. Now, the Enterprise explores space and occasionally runs into these colonies and we get to explore how different societies have evolved, succeeded, or failed. It would take that “parallel worlds” approach of TOS and make it plausible, but also create for some interesting stories and an interesting way to explore humanity.
I would up the dial on the hard science. But only so much. I wouldn’t try to make it “2001” but I wouldn’t leave it where it currently is either. I’d still have aliens, but I’d completely re-imagine them.
I’ve said a couple of times that I think you could do a TOS re-imagine if you set it in like the 27th century. The backstory would be that in the 23rd through 25th centuries, man discovered ftl travel and various cultures launched deep space colonization efforts across the galaxy. There was some sort of “event” that distracted mankind over the intervening 250 years, halting that process and causing most of those colonies to be lost or forgotten. Now, the Enterprise explores space and occasionally runs into these colonies and we get to explore how different societies have evolved, succeeded, or failed. It would take that “parallel worlds” approach of TOS and make it plausible, but also create for some interesting stories and an interesting way to explore humanity.
I would up the dial on the hard science. But only so much. I wouldn’t try to make it “2001” but I wouldn’t leave it where it currently is either. I’d still have aliens, but I’d completely re-imagine them.
One of the keys to how Star Trek was imagined was that in some way Spock is half human and half vulcan. Plus warp drive and the transporter. Other than those quite difficult to accomplish things, I would love to see a parallel Star Trek that went with more accurate science. I don't think it would have to change all that much, but in some ways it would be significant. But to make it truly hard SF, Spock, warp drive, and the transporter can't exist. And I'm not sure that is a Star Trek anyone would care to see.
Similar threads
