Tales Of The Federation - Akiva Goldsman wants anthology series with classic characters

[Dukhat]

From my read Roddenberry looked at TMP and TNG as reboots. His "true vision" of Star Trek.
Never cared for the "cowboy diplomacy", shoot from the hip image Janeway (and the VOYwriters) tried casting TOS as
Fans hated ENT for stepping on TOS toes with an earlier ship called "Enterprise" and a Vulcan XO/SO.

I agree with you about Roddenberry wanting TNG to be more of a reboot then a sequel. But that’s not actually an invalidation of what came before any more than Ron Moore’s BSG is invalidating Glen Larson’s BSG.

As for VOY, considering I can’t even remember any character on that show bad-mouthing the TOS era, it’s almost insignificant to me to be not an issue at all. It’s certainly nothing like completely changing the visuals of the previous show to something unrecognizable from what the era was supposed to look like.

Not seeing the issue with a Vulcan XO on an Earth ship that happens to share a name with a Federation ship from 100 years in the future.

 

[Nerys Myk]

I agree with you about Roddenberry wanting TNG to be more of a reboot then a sequel. But that’s not actually an invalidation of what came before any more than Ron Moore’s BSG is invalidating Glen Larson’s BSG.

As for VOY, considering I can’t even remember any character on that show bad-mouthing the TOS era, it’s almost insignificant to me to be not an issue at all. It’s certainly nothing like completely changing the visuals of the previous show to something unrecognizable from what the era was supposed to look like.

Not seeing the issue with a Vulcan XO on an Earth ship that happens to share a name with a Federation ship from 100 years in the future.

You may not, but others did.

 

[Starbreaker]

Greenlight this right now. Garak, Worf, Janeway, all the other characters who have actors itching to get back into the universe.

 

[Dukhat]

You may not, but others did.

Well, that ain’t my problem. If people think that an Earth ship named the Enterprise with a Vulcan as 2nd in command is some kind of slap in TOS’s face (never mind the TOS-fest that was In A Mirror Darkly), then I don’t know what to tell them. I will admit that the 22nd century as depicted in ENT was not what my head-canon thought it would be, but that’s my problem.

 

[dupersuper]

I agree. That's one of the reasons I think DS9 was the most successful Trek. There were of course some new aspects added via the show, like the Dominion and the Prophets. But much of the concept of the show spun out of a single TNG episode (Ensign Ro)

Also The Wounded...and Best of Both Worlds...even The Host a bit.

The worst aspect of how the later shows treat TOS is how jumped up in importance The Enterprise and Kirk become.

In TOS, we never really believed The Enterprise was that special. I believe it was one of a dozen ships of the same class. We can imagine the other 11 ships with largely analogous ships getting into adventures of roughly the same scope. Because the TOS scope is small, not epic. It's save the ship this week, or a planet or solar system - never save the galaxy. Also note that none of the antagonists Kirk goes up against have a higher ranking than captain or commander. Kirk is just a Captain, The Enterprise is just a ship.

The TOS movies started "epicing" it up as fanservice, since Kirk got to save Earth twice, but Berman Trek leaned into it hard, making the Enterprise crew into this legendary group of people. I can understand the desire to hang a lampshade, but...I think the franchise ultimately suffered, because it's progressively gotten to be more and more small universe over time. I preferred in a lot of ways the wide open "man adrift in the vastness of space" feeling of TOS to regularly meeting the heads of massive interstellar empires.

I mean...it was epic. Enterprise was just one of several Constitution class vessels in the beginning (though one captained by the youngest person to make Captain with a record of commendations too long to bother listening to before a trial - including a certain one for original thinking - and first officered by the son of a prominent diplomat and foster brother of a woman arrested for mutiny at the onset of a Klingon War who had mysteriously vanished a year later - a man T'Pring said had already become something of a legend by Amok Time, and Spock and crew would go on to distinguished careers afterwards, and Kirk would teach at the academy, die saving the Enterprise B and a ship of refugees, then come back and die again saving a planet, then come back again in the novels...), but by the end of Kirk's captaincy they'd saved the Earth from V'Ger and the whale probe, saved two universes by dealing with Lazarus, time travelled several times, discovered the Guardian of Forever, were instrumental in the first Khitomer Accords and the Organian Peace Treaty, encountered the Romulans after decades of silence from them, met a Greek god and an Aztek god and a would be Judeo-Christian God and the devil and Da Vinci and Jack the Ripper and Khan and Zefram Cochran, stopped a doomsday machine and a planet eating cloud and a giant space amoeba, made more first contacts than any one until Voyager got stranded in another quadrant, went through both the great barrier and galactic barrier...it would be bizarre if they weren't heroes to future Starfleet.

 

[fireproof78]

Heroes to some. Not all of Starfleet.

 

[Zeke]

Who do you mean? I can't think of any exceptions.

 

[F. King Daniel]

As for VOY, considering I can’t even remember any character on that show bad-mouthing the TOS era, it’s almost insignificant to me to be not an issue at all. It’s certainly nothing like completely changing the visuals of the previous show to something unrecognizable from what the era was supposed to look like.

I recall a Da Vinci/Flint mention when they had that hologram, Janeway going "Kirk claimed to have met him... but the evidence is less than conclusive" and some took that personally. Especially coming from the captain that met Emilia Earhart

 

[wayne66]

This is a great idea. A great way to bring back all these wonderful characters..I love anthology shows. Star Trek should definitely do one. Make it so.

 

[BillJ]

Jesus, don't these people have any original ideas?

 

[Nerys Myk]

Jesus, don't these people have any original ideas?

No, just variations on the original ideas from our days around the campfire.

 

[BillJ]

No, just variations on the original ideas from our days around the campfire.

I'm talking about within the context of Star Trek.

There just comes a time when one becomes bored of them just recycling the same characters over and over. YMMV.

 

[Nerys Myk]

I'm talking about within the context of Star Trek.

There just comes a time when one becomes bored of them just recycling the same characters over and over. YMMV.

They're still using those campfire ideas.

It's been a mixed bag. Original characters and new ones. SNW seems to be the show that leans heavily into established characters. The others have mostly used them as guest stars and reoccurring characters. Given the reaction to SNW, revisiting old characters seems to be popular. So why not a show that's all about that.

Star Wars is doing the same by revisiting characters from the past like Obi-wan, Luke, Ahsoka, Boba and a litany of animated characters. I wouldn't be surprised if a Star Wars anthology show was announced.

 

[BillJ]

Star Wars is doing the same by revisiting characters from the past like Obi-wan, Luke, Ahsoka, Boba and a litany of animated characters. I wouldn't be surprised if a Star Wars anthology show was announced.

For me, that is wearing thin as well. Though they have a leg up as they aren't trying to redesign the universe then pass it off as the one Lucas created.

 

[Ray Hardgrit]

Star Trek is bringing a lot of classic characters back, but for every returning Spock and Sarek we get a Burnham, Saru, Stamets, Tilly, Lorca etc. Picard and Seven's series has given us Rios, Dr Jurati, Soji, Raffi, Laris and Elnor, Janeway's series has given us Dal, Gwyn, Rok-Tahk, Zero, Jankom Pog and so on. We've never had so many new characters in such a short time.

 

[Nerys Myk]

For me, that is wearing thin as well. Though they have a leg up as they aren't trying to redesign the universe then pass it off as the one Lucas created.

.I like the characters and stories. Could care less if a star destroyer or a starship is redesigned or some data point is changed, eliminated or never mentioned.

 

[fireproof78]

.I like the characters and stories. Could care less if a star destroyer or a starship is redesigned or some data point is changed, eliminated or never mentioned.

Exactly. If I am invested in the characters then artists are going to imagine something else. That's the nature of art! It's not to sit there and dramatically recreate past productions in painstaking detail. That isn't what artists try to do. They try to bring their own view on art, on a world. It's imagination at work.

It's the same thing that authors do for licensed works all the time. Except on screen, or in comics.

 

[BillJ]

That's the nature of art! It's not to sit there and dramatically recreate past productions in painstaking detail. They try to bring their own view on art, on a world.

Then why slavishly try to connect their work to old work? Because the characters and stories are art as well.

 

[fireproof78]

Then why slavishly try to connect the work to old work? Because the characters and stories are art as well.

Because it's expanding upon previous stories. It's learning more about characters. It's why Shatner wrote a book about Kirk and Spock having an adventure prior to either of them being in Starfleet. It's fun.

 

[BillJ]

Because it's expanding upon previous stories. It's learning more about characters. It's why Shatner wrote a book about Kirk and Spock having an adventure prior to either of them being in Starfleet. It's fun.

By connecting the past stories the way they do, they are essentially giving away their imagination for a story that has already been told.