If you could reboot TNG...

[Wingsley]

There is a thread in the TOS forum about how participants would've rebooted TOS.

If you could reboot TNG, how would you do it?

This discussion could go in several directions, all of them interesting.

You could go back to 1987, and simply redirect the TNG effort and make the voyages of the Enterprise-D different. You could either make subtle changes in the TNG show, or huge ones.

Or you could go the JJ Abrams approach. (Don't look now, but the Abrams reboot wipes away all of canon, including TNG)

 

[Shazam!]

(Don't look now, but the Abrams reboot wipes away all of canon, including TNG)

No it doesn't : /

 

[FalTorPan]

In many ways I think TNG's premise and aspirations were unrealizable by its limited TV budget.

The Enterprise-D was an enormous vessel with an ambitious, long-term mission. In many ways she was a "colony ship," but for all that we saw of her, particularly after the first season, the ship might as well have been the size of Voyager or Kirk's Enterprise.

I suppose I might have narrowed the scope of the show's premise, so that it was more consistent with what could be practically achieved. Then again, my imagination filled in many blanks, so perhaps I would have changed nothing significant.

 

[Wingsley]

There does seem to be some question as to what Roddenberry was thinking when he came up with the idea of this huge Galaxy-class starship with a large civilian presence on board. And yes, in many respects most of TNG could've been set aboard a slightly larger version of a cruiser-class ship like Kirk's Enterprise. I don't think it ever really sunk in how much of a change there was from Kirk's Enterprise to the Excelsior in the third movie. That would represent quite a milestone in growth of starship capacity and capability, regardless of whether it had transwarp drive. In many ways, I would expect the progression from Constitution-class to Excelsior-class would be far more dramatic than the TMP refit. We're talking about a significant increase in crew and facilities space here.

For all of the Enterprise-D's initial "wow" factor, TNG's makers treated the ship as if she were still little more than a Connie. I'd call that short-sighted at least.

So, are you saying that the Enterprise-D should have been more like Kirk's Enterprise, just with superior technologies?

 

[Anwar]

I would have made the Ferengi more sophisticated businessmen types in their first appearance who employ more brutish mercenary races for thefts and raids on other races instead of the snarly little trolls. The appearance can stand though. The Ferengi would use their economic prominence and prowess to protect themselves by monopolizing resource trading in certain business sectors that the Feds can't openly antagonize them otherwise the Ferengi screw up galactic trading and economies for the rest of Known Space (other than themselves since they'd have surplus amounts of credits and resources in unmarked accounts and caches for emergency recessions). An enemy that can't be beaten by an actual weapon since their power is beyond military control.

And I'd make the Cardassians more prominent from the very start.

 

[RyuRoots]

Or you could go the JJ Abrams approach. (Don't look now, but the Abrams reboot wipes away all of canon, including TNG)

Actually no, it doesn't. In fact, they go out of their way to say as much just about as plainly as they can in the middle of ST XI.

As for the topic at hand, not sure what I would change aside from making the first two seasons (with a couple of exceptions) un-exist. Oh! The random civilian families thing. Christ, that was f*cking stupid. I'd have that never be a part of the show.

 

[Ro Boat]

Even less humans in the crew.

 

[TheSeeker]

There isn't much I would change. TNG is one of my favourite shows of all time but I think there was room for improvement in some areas.

• Families on board a ship that can regularly find itself in hostile situations is just a bad idea.
• I would make Geordi Chief engineer from the get go
• Have Troi in a uniform from day one and make her less emotional in the early days when she sensed people's feelings
• Place Worf in security from the start.
• No Wesley
• More exploration of the ship's capabilities. After seeing some of Probert's design work it made me realize how little of the sip we actually got to see
• Make Picard British

That's all I can think of for now.