New people, new things. No new wine in old wineskins. Exploration of the origins of Trek is the key to universe building a concept. Radical extreme departures are unnecessary just because what we have seen didn't all work. That is really thinking in opposites and not very attractive.
Exploring a darker theme in a future star trek series
- Thread starter EmoBorg
- Start date
Again, there are some interesting ideas in amongst these, others would need a little more thought. What follows are just some thoughts to consider, in order to play Devil’s Advocate to help refine the ideas.
An interesting idea. It does raise questions about how individuals react to different situations, and would ask people to think how they would react. Would they fight to the bitter end, or escape and save themselves. DS9 touched on it in an episode during the UFP/Klingon War, when Jake and Bashir are stuck on a colony, when a young soldier comes into the hospital after shooting himself in the foot in order to get out of the fighting. It is one thing that hasn’t been explored in depth (to my recollection): duty or survival? Training or self-preservation?
It would take one helluva fleet, not to mention thousands of boarding teams to pull that off. Not sure the three powers would commit so many resources to such a mission. More likely I would think they’d just aim to destroy the Cube. As for Starfleet sharing their new tech, it would depend on how stable their relations were with the Romulans. As for getting over being assimilated, that’s been done with Seven and Locutus. Not really sure there is much more that needs to be done with the idea.
I kinda like the Borg origins being a mystery. There has been plenty speculated (though I don’t buy the whole V’ger idea) but not everything needs an explanation. The Borg work best when they are an unstoppable force of cyber-zombies, set on one goal: brains, assimilating all the knowledge in your brains. They should be returned to that status, having learnt from all their encounters with Voyager, they come back bigger and bader than ever before.
Whilst some people may have some issues with individuals of other species, due to cultural differences, etc, out and out racism is a thing of the past by the 24th century for humans. Also on a Defiant-Class, which has only a crew of 40-50, it seems risky to air ones bigotry in such tight confines. As for the same accident that occurred on the Defiant, that was only caused because of the cloaking device, and as the only Starfleet ship with one, then this could be replicated. Going back in time so they can get a taste of their own medicine also seems a bit hammy to me. The issue of racism could be raised with a time travel plot, but I’m not sure you’d need the set up of the main character in question is a racist to begin with.
I was once part of a PBeM Sim that briefly had a female Nausicaan science officer onboard. Since then I’ve loved the idea of having a Nausicaan in uniform and having to overcome the stereotyping of their race, whilst also trying to prove that he/she can fit in with ‘civilised’ society.
Why would an entrepreneur (who would obviously need to be educated and read up on the culture they were joining) risk his/her business future by not conforming and only performing their religious rights when off planet? Or better yet, why even go there if it interferes with their beliefs? It would be more of a legal battle than anything else, with lawyers and diplomats being at the forefront. The Prime Directive is something that is in place for Starfleet so I’m not sure how it would apply to a private citizen.
What, like the Birth of the Federation? An ENT replay (done right this time) is one of my perennial favorite ideas. It's so damn simple, why can't they get it right? The Earth-Romulan war forces Earth to find allies, which forms the nucleus of the Federation. Done and done.
So true. I would love that too. And maybe, just maybe if they get around the idea some day once again they will understand that it ain't important for the ship to be called Enterprise, it ain't important to see the ferengies (and not call them by they name) or the borg, but it is important to be done right ... If cannon of the future series said nukes, give us nukes, if they say that humans never saw a Romulan face to face, keep it simple: do not show them face to face ... And one more thing: a 24th century ship turned upside down does not count as chunkier and bulkier and 200 years earlier model ... It really does not.
I agree. I'd say that, for Star Trek, it should not go any darker than that. DS9 had it's more "serious" themes, but at the same time still knew when to have fun.
Darkness shouldn't be the broader tone of a new Star Trek show. That's not what's made Trek so popular for almost 50 years, and it's not going to carry an entire series anyway.
Give us an optimistic and hopeful message set against a backdrop of galactic uncertainty. Make the cosmos seem mysterious and wondrous again.
Set it about 30-40 years after the destruction of Romulus.
Give us a swashbuckling captain -- a flawed but noble man that an audience (particularly a young or young-adult audience) can enjoy following.
Give us an intelligent, personable, and diverse crew. They should both compliment and complicate their own relationships with each other and the show itself.
Give us a cool new ship.
Don't hit people over the head with a specific sociopolitical agenda. Yawn, change the channel. Employ subtlety, and it's more effective anyway.
Be serialized and episodic. They're not mutually exclusive. In a story this big, with this many possibilities, stop limiting yourself.
Stop relying on all the familiar villains and locations. Incorporate them, but don't depend on them. Create the next "Borg."
Make it a new adventure.
Give us an optimistic and hopeful message set against a backdrop of galactic uncertainty. Make the cosmos seem mysterious and wondrous again.
Set it about 30-40 years after the destruction of Romulus.
Give us a swashbuckling captain -- a flawed but noble man that an audience (particularly a young or young-adult audience) can enjoy following.
Give us an intelligent, personable, and diverse crew. They should both compliment and complicate their own relationships with each other and the show itself.
Give us a cool new ship.
Don't hit people over the head with a specific sociopolitical agenda. Yawn, change the channel. Employ subtlety, and it's more effective anyway.
Be serialized and episodic. They're not mutually exclusive. In a story this big, with this many possibilities, stop limiting yourself.
Stop relying on all the familiar villains and locations. Incorporate them, but don't depend on them. Create the next "Borg."
Make it a new adventure.
Picard was like watching a fish for seven years in a tank. Riker was a man whore. Sisko was the best, but watching him wear that ugly Picard uniform only darker and more dismal was unbearable. Odo was depressing. Quark was ass ugly. I could go on and on, but nobody likes to see disfigured ugly except at the DMV. Nobody ever had control over all the departments except Berman though they may have thought they did, they didn't.What a twenty year disaster and now something worse. The only available and emotionally accessable Captain was Kirk. Maybe they should base it on new Romulus and the political ramifications of that. Getting lost in the Delta quadrant was a wrong message to base a series on. The NX-01 was a stupid design because it was already obsolete. How stupid and short sighted do you have to be to work at Paramount? Braga is a very weak willed sort. But Berman was a tank.
TerraNovan
Lieutenant Commander
It wasn't a question of simply being dark, it was the strong character development that made the darkness pleasant.
Anyhow bsg wasn't that dark you guys need to get more in touch with the real world.
Anyhow I don't think star trek should get dystopian, the utopian ideals should get explored farther, but in adult terms.
Utopia in pragmatic terms isn't perfect. I think any future series should explore the true costs of living in a utopia.
Their are obvious restrictions in terms of personal freedom,
anti drugs, anti gene moding, anti capitalistic etc.
A civilization based on colonization (it's a wagon trail afterall)
should explore the environmental risks of living on the frontier. Radiation exposure, unstable planets etc. This can create a great deal of conflict, and story if done over the arc of several episodes. Prime example is the episode where picard relived a lifetime in a dieing civilization.
If it's an adult world, explore the different cultures of these different worlds. Not in a value based system, where some message is forced onto the audience, but in more of a passive secondary way, where part of the adventure is in the discovery of theses cultures.
Don't just glorify the role of a ships captain, play up the role of legal experts, paramedics, firefighters, biologist etc, this is something trek can be great at. Even an episode on train spotting can be great if you play on the right themes.
If a utopia, is free of sexual diseases, fit, and free of social constructs, explore what this means. A future where the captain believes is having relations with everyone and anyone could provide some very interest character development. If done discretely.
Knight Templar
Commodore
nuBSG was only a modest ratings success. I don't think there's a terribly strong appetite for dark & dire space opera. If Robert Hewitt Wolfe goes lighter and more morally simple with Defender (assuming we ever see it), I think that could get a wider audience - something that hits around the level of TOS for moral complexity. Don't ignore or sugarcoat it, but in the end, the good guys need to win.
Anyhow bsg wasn't that dark you guys need to get more in touch with the real world.
I don't know enough about Goth to venture an opinion, but emo ANYTHING is something that needs to be dial back considerably.
TerraNovan
Lieutenant Commander
Well I keep on thinking about this darker theme and you know what it keeps coming on my mind? SG:U. Sg1 and SG:A never were really dark in tone, I might even say they were Star Trekish. So bring on to this equation SG:U and you can see the fans reaction. I like darker themes, you like darker themes, but the real question is what will be the general reaction among fans, and will a darker series bring on more audience, or maybe loose even more ...
Darkness of a sci-fi drama like Star Trek should be a byproduct of theme and character exploration, rather than an end goal in and of itself. Deep Space 9 went into shades of gray territory and heavier plots because it was a setting built on various differing peoples and groups dealing with each other and what the results of such encounters would be.
Really I'd say the most interesting element for a new Trek series to build upon would not be darkness per say, but rather consequences. That was one of the main issues of Voyager and to a lesser degree Enterprise; they were shows where the characters actions didn't seem to really matter in the long term, and the effects of various episodes just weren't felt.
There is a place for serialized Star Trek show illustrating the blowback caused by the character's actions & in-actions, especially given we are in the most continuity driven era of dramatic television ever.
While I'm not against giving the characters real flaws and depth, I think the most radical thing a new Trek could do is bringing back real heroes as the main characters in an era of so many morally compromised protagonists (Breaking Bad, Mad Men, Game of Thrones, just to name a few).
Really I'd say the most interesting element for a new Trek series to build upon would not be darkness per say, but rather consequences. That was one of the main issues of Voyager and to a lesser degree Enterprise; they were shows where the characters actions didn't seem to really matter in the long term, and the effects of various episodes just weren't felt.
There is a place for serialized Star Trek show illustrating the blowback caused by the character's actions & in-actions, especially given we are in the most continuity driven era of dramatic television ever.
While I'm not against giving the characters real flaws and depth, I think the most radical thing a new Trek could do is bringing back real heroes as the main characters in an era of so many morally compromised protagonists (Breaking Bad, Mad Men, Game of Thrones, just to name a few).
So, what you're saying is that Goth and emo are the same thing?
