How would you handle a TOS reboot/remake/continuation?

A combination of talk about a Pike show, seeing the Enterprise bridge in the new Discovery episode, and the ongoing thread about Pike's "woman on the bridge" line got me thinking.

If, hypothetically, CBS decided to have a remake of Star Trek today, what kind of features would you want to see in it? I ordinarily hate reboots and remakes, and my immediate response to such a thing would be "why bother?", but I think I've talked myself into this.

The way this could work is have, say, a 26 episode season (I have no idea if this is practically viable in today's TV climate, but whatever), and about 6 or so of those episodes could be remakes of fan-favourite TOS episodes. I'm thinking Arena, Mirror Mirror, City on the Edge, Space Seed, A Taste of Armageddon, The Doomsday Machine and so on could all work fantastically in the modern day with only minor script changes (obviously, staying as close to the originals as possible would be of paramount importance here) and, obviously, new visuals. The remaining episodes can all be totally new stories. I'd want it to be episodic because that's what Star Trek is to me and it's my favourite mode of TV storytelling, but there could be continuing background plots and character arcs to appeal to people who enjoy serialised ongoing stories.

In a way, the term "reboot" doesn't convey what I mean - all the new stories would have stardates that don't conflict with existing TOS, so existing canon remains essentially untouched. We simply fill in the gaps in the first 3 years of the mission with new stories, and go into the 4th and 5th years if need be. So less a reboot, and more a continuation, if you like.

Here are some of the benefits of this concept that I can think of, in messy list form:

- Major advantage: remove the sexism/misogyny that undermines whole episodes. Pike's line in The Cage is far from the worst example - Wolf in the Fold, for example, is total frigging nonsense from start to finish. Elaan of Troyius can go climb a tree as well, and so can all the nasty lines, scenes and treatments of characters scattered across the series that I'm sure we could list. I'm not suggesting going back with a fine comb through the series and removing everything objectionable, but rather simply showing things differently through new scripts. One of the easiest examples I can think of is to just have a female captain on another Constitution-class vessel, showing that the situation established in Turnabout Intruder is obviously not true.

- Following on from that, characters like Janice Rand who get completely mistreated by the scripts of TOS could now have a chance to grow and become vivid, proper characters. Similarly, the rest of the bridge crew can get actual personalities and have more to do - TAS already sort of showed glimpses of this.

- I mentioned this in the Pike show thread in the Discovery subforum, but any revisiting of the 23rd Century offers us the chance to have some proper Andorian, Tellarite, etc characters. Both cultures are pretty much a blank slate to work with, with some great stuff in fan works/novels to integrate into canon, should the writers choose. I think it'd be great to flesh out the Federation's founding members like this, and I've never been totally sure why every show except Enterprise has neglected them, considering their importance within the Federation.

- Another bonus is the opportunity to fix up the continuity a little. This needn't turn into a fanwank nightmare where Spock just spends 20 minutes reciting Memory Alpha articles to the camera - just minor lines here and there to help everything gel together more smoothly. This can work in tying things very loosely to the TNG/VOY/DS9 era, too - we could have a plot, or even just a bit of dialogue, about the newly-contacted Betazoids and/or their entry into the Federation, for example.

- We could also give Spock a throwaway line or two about "my Human sister", rescuing us from the canon-wars that presently engulf the fandom.

So again, I know everyone (or at least, me) hates reboots and believes in leaving great things untouched, but I've been playing the old PC adventure games Star Trek 25th Anniversary and Judgement Rites recently, and they convinced me that the TOS setting and characters are so strong that there are virtually infinite high quality stories still to be told using them, so why not do it while revisiting some of the best of TOS in the process?

How would you produce such a series? Are my ideas any good, or just abjectly terrible? Have at it.

 

I'm not a fan of reboots and in Star Trek the pre-existing shows are so embedded in canon that I think any attempt to remake them would fall flat. I did read the NuTrek comic adaptations of classic episodes but they limited them to two issues, which wasn't really enough to do them justice.

That said, I agree that modern versions could theoretically improve on many of the concepts. Some could be expanded into two or more episodes akin to old school Dr Who, to expand on alien cultures, politics, characterisation for the supporting cast, and to add some layers to the story.

I'm not a fan of reboots but I'm fine with recasting. The warmth with which the fan-created shows were received shows that there is an audience that would love to see more live action stories for these characters. I think ultimately, it would not be allowed to happen because of merchandising issues.

By far the best option IMO is to go for Phase II set after TMP and build on modernising that look to give it a style of its own. The main recurring characters are there, including Chief Rand, plus the alien crew. You could even spend a season dealing with the resurrection of Decker and Ilia as originally planned - lots of fun to be had with identity, PTSD, etc, similar to where they went in Discovery.

 

As with everything Trek, I'd probably handle it quite open-mindedly.

 

If you were to go down the reboot route, you might as well through out all but the basic elements and start more or less from scratch.

 

Captain Kirk and crew in Kindergarten.

 

If it's well written, with good casting, I'm in.

Setting new episodes "in-between" old TOS episodes might be interesting, maybe with some (not many) call outs to what happen in the episode it follows. After we get pass Turnabout Intruder, just press on from there.

If it is a TOS story line, I'd want more of a continuation, than a complete reset of all the basics. If you're going to do a major reboot, just make a entirely new show.

Not what I would want to see.

Remove no, tone down a couple of notches okay. Making everyone's sensibilities from modern day would feel off, TOS isn't set in 2019. There should be differences in social structure.

Take Kirk. While not the total horndog popular culture sometimes paints him as, Kirk is a womanizer. He charms and flirts out of habit, and he likes to get women into bed, it's simply a part of the character's make up. Removing this aspect would diminish the character. If you want to view this as a character flaw (I don't) feel free. People get to have flaws.

Why?

Great episode. Secret mission, an arranged political marriage, a love potion, sabotage, fighting the Klingons, Kirk wins through being sneaky.

Don't know about this. If it isn't going to be Kirk and Spock on the Enterprise, then just another TOS era ship might not do it. But it might come back to how well it's written.

And for me personally, it would also come down to just how unlike Discovery they can make it.

 

I loathe sexism in sci fi but I do agree that if set during TOS, the show should just add a feminist gloss to what was there. Rand should still deliver Kirk's coffee but it should be acknowledged that she is trained to shoot, fight, fly, and fix the ship like anyone else. Harlan Ellison tried to show that in his CotEoF script so it's not as if this is far from what she could have been.

I do take issue with Kirk being a 'horndog' though. He's actually just lonely. He is willing to seduce women when the mission requires and he seemed quite horny in the Immunity Syndrome but generally it's not about sex.

 

I've brought up my idea a few times before in other threads. If I was doing it I would start off with Captain April. Then give him 5 seasons. After that bring in Pike for 10 seasons. Then we would have one season of Kirk after which the original three seasons would be inserted, followed up by another final season with Kirk.

All of these productions would need to seamlessly fit with existing episodes in terms of look, storytelling, acting, etc. So for Pike and crew and Kirk and crew you would needs to top notch CGI and voice acting.

Basically it would be giving us a full 20 seasons of Star Trek as if it had been made back in the '60s.

Captain Kirk and Kids

I can hear the opening jingle now.

 

if they did it right

 

Similar to Star Trek continues but with better trained actors! In the background artists which was the shows weak point I feel! Forget the flashy suits, the flashy effects, the flashy story lines that you can forget in an hour, give us the original series in that style and continuation! Forget about the talk about sexism and this or that agenda, that's why we loved this series so much!
JB

 

I actually like the shorter seasons in "prestige" TV productions. It allows them to have more well-produced episodes and less filler.

Kor

 

Baby Captain Kirk : “Hey, Spock-O! Let’s play Lost in Space!”

Baby Spock : “Totally illogical.”

 

The original Star Trek is just fine as is. I don't need to see remakes of episodes that I already like. I can understand that attitudes were different when the show was made and I take that into account as I do with all tv shows and movies that I watch.

 

I’ve always wanted to see a continuing story that follows the original 79 episodes in order through the eyes of some crewman we’ve never seen before. So we learn his or her story and his or her friends and coworkers and whatever drama as they have going on and in the background we can actually tell that their events are happening during original TOS episodes. You have to know that for some crew men seeing Kirk and Spock in the hallway is like a celebrity viewing. So that element would be in there too. How many Naked Time stories happened to the nameless crew that we never got to see? What kind of drama were we missing among the 392 crewman trapped in the lower decks in Day of the Dove?

 

I think it's already happening on Discovery. Pike and the Enterprise are there, in a few more years, horrible disfigurement for Pike and Jim takes over.

 

I don’t know if the disfigurement caused his loss of command though, did it? I seem to remember it was a surprise to Kirk in Menagerie. He’d know otherwise.

 

Yes, of course. I was summarizing. I believe the whole reason he was there was he was assigned to training new cadets and on an older ship so he was off Enterprise. I was just thinking, unpopular as this will be, the big question of "why is it only 10 years before TOS?" is it's a back door prequel for a remake of the original series if the ratings didn't go the way they wanted, not that it was the whole plan but a contingency plan.

 

Hmm, I don’t think they’ll touch that though. To me, every new series builds upon its predecessor in one obvious way, and that is the “isn’t this a better idea?“ thing. Sure, Discovery may take place 10 years before TOS, but the look and feel is far beyond it. If I were on Discovery and I beamed aboard Pike’s enterprise, it would feel like I was stepping back in time, not like I was boarding Starfleet’s flag ship. So, given that reality, they have two options: one, update pikes ship to look more like discovery which would be weird, or else faithfully reproduce it which would also be weird. OMG, now that I typed this I just realized they’ve already made their choice in Discovery season two, which I haven’t seen yet because I’m waiting for it all to be released so that I can get my free trial of CBS all access and binge watch it in that 30 day window like I did for season one. Wait did I just admit that?