Oh...JUST JUMP!!!

[RobertScorpio]

Spock's death in KHAN...Picard becoming Locutus...the Federation winning in DS9...

There have been many times when TREK, trying to do something different for plot reasons, veered sharply in another direction...but eventually drifted back to the safe harbor where they departed from...reset button.

What event in Trek's past would you not have 'reset' if you had the choice. Just let the chips fall where they may and headed off in a new direction, and away from the vanila endings Paramount seemed to play a part in.

Where would you have taken the plunge off the cliff of originality and kept going?

Rob
Scorpio

 

[Chekov's Phaser]

How Voyager handled the whole Maquis and Starfleet crew. It looked like there was really going to be something different to explore: a crew that didn't get along. Could have been some real interesting stuff, but they played it safe, and they all loved each other within a few episodes. Would have been cool to see them develop a friendship rather than one being forced on.

 

[RyuRoots]

I think of those 3, Spock's 'death' is the only okay example, and even then it's one of the ones I don't have a problem with.

But I agree that the Maquis thing is the big thing that springs to mind. There were, including Caretaker, what, 3 eps of Voyager that you had even the SLIGHTEST indication that the crew wasn't all Starfleet from the get-go judging how people acted around each other(provisional rank indicators notwithstanding)? And in those cases they beat you over the head with it.

 

[RobertScorpio]

How Voyager handled the whole Maquis and Starfleet crew. It looked like there was really going to be something different to explore: a crew that didn't get along. Could have been some real interesting stuff, but they played it safe, and they all loved each other within a few episodes. Would have been cool to see them develop a friendship rather than one being forced on.

You know? This is exactly what I was going to go with; Voyager. I thought they should have let the two ships survive and have to enter a very 'loose' alliance to get back home together. Then they could have done episodes 'apart' from each other to allow more growth. This, I think, would have added some 'sexual' tension between Janeway and Chakotay as 'competing' yet very 'lonely' commanders of their ships.

But, like you said, the show played it safe. At times it was good, i wont deny that. But what was a great concept at the start was just molded into plain old TREk..vanila..safe.

Rob

 

[Alidar Jarok]

I was going to go with the specific episode of Year of Hell (a reset isn't a problem, but this one was just confusing to me at the time), but after reading other posts I'll definitely go with the starfleet/maquis dynamic that was swept under the rug too early.

 

[Deranged Nasat]

I would like to second (well, technically fourth of fifth) the Maquis issue in Voyager as being the most troubling backout/lazy happy outcome. The two crews should have had an uneasy alliance. Both ships should have survived, travelled together, maybe fall out at one point and spend a season at odds, even fighting one another. The characters should have been split half way in terms of faction, Janeway and Chakotay should have had a sexual tension/friendly enemy type relationship. Delta Quadrant races they encountered could've joined them, picked sides...an entire squabbling proto-Federation could have formed.

Let me mention here that I am a big fan of Voyager. I thought it had great characters, engaging stories and was generally a good show. However, it could have been a fantastic one if the Maquis issue had been handled differently.

(PS: love the new avatar, Alidar Jarok. Do Australian Bower Birds have no shame?)

 

[Alidar Jarok]

It's actually my old avatar I brought back because I got tired with my green peace dove. But, yes, they have no shame.

 

[startrekwatcher]

The one that has always irked me was the Prophets stepping in and making the Dominion reinforcements disappear. I soooooooo wanted them to come through and have the Federation falling.

I was satisfied with Picard being salvaged in BoBW.

 

[Luckyflux]

Maybe Riker taking one of the three ship commands he was offered? I can't image TNG without Riker, but having him become a Captain with his own ship and leaving that blonde cutie from BoBW (Lt Shelby was it?) taking over as 1st Officer, might have been OK.

Nah, scratch that, my idea stinks...

 

[barnaclelapse]

I gotta go with the Maquis thing. It might be that I just never got into Voyager, but that really seems like one of the key moments where a lot of Trek fans just got sick of the same old thing, the same old easy way out of whatever creative corner they painted themselves into.

 

[Triskelion]

Funny, Voyager was the first thing I thought of too. The ship damage, and repair, should have been more ongoing. Probably a constant effort to keep up with just making the system function. Then on top of the technical problems you have all the galactic anomalies and warmongering mayhem to deal with, and crewmembers just grabbing what little humanity they could in their off hours.

 

[Anwar]

Well, that had less to do with the writers than with the Network. UPN and Paramount wanted a generic Trek show mainly episodic they could air and then sell into syndication to make them a ton of $$$, and figured a show with a tensioned crew and continuous storytelling wouldn't make $$$ (they were right, those types of shows don't make a lot of money). So they told the writers to drop that stuff before "Caretaker" was aired.

 

[Triskelion]

^ Interesting... and I remember you had some very intriguing ideas along those lines too Anwar, in your own reimagining of Voyager. Can you post the link?

 

[Anwar]

I rewrote the version I put out and improved the ending but here's the original version:

http://www.trekbbs.com/showthread.php?t=34029

 

[Nerys Ghemor]

How Voyager handled the whole Maquis and Starfleet crew. It looked like there was really going to be something different to explore: a crew that didn't get along. Could have been some real interesting stuff, but they played it safe, and they all loved each other within a few episodes. Would have been cool to see them develop a friendship rather than one being forced on.

Ohhhh yeah, definitely.

And I saw an idea that Guy Gardner suggested in the VOY forum that I loved.

What about having Evek's ship stranded in the Delta Quadrant as well, and THEM being forced to get along with Voyager and the Maquis in order to get home? That would've been interesting...

 

[Anwar]

Heck, just replace the Maquis entirely with Evek's ship. Having the other crew be Cardassians would have made more sense for a crew-tension thing since they really WERE the Fed's enemies and had real ideological and cultural/social differences with them unlike the Maquis. Plus Trek usually goes for theatre actors for the heavier makeup aliens because they can express better through it all meaning probably better actors for half the cast.

 

[Plecostomus]

Not so much into the Fall Of Federation stuff but I would have liked to seen a change of command on the Enterprise-D either through Picard's death or his retirement. All new command crew maybe.... maybe not. Riker gone on his own command, Picard dead or retired, keep everyone else.

Now with DS9, I would have loved to have seen the Federation have to accommodate the Dominion. Not surrender outright or become subservient to them but have to accept the fact that A) The Federation went poking where it shouldn't have, B) Certain Alpha Quad races want to become members of the Dominion or share exclusive trade arrangements with them and C) The Dominion is here to stay like it or not.

That in my opinion would have been a far far more interesting storyline than "They came, they kicked butt, they were defeated by Plot Device!"


Voyager... had the network not nixed the "continuing arc" idea I think the Marquis/Federation being forced to cooperate idea is grand. Also I would have liked to see more fallout from having the ship damaged and rigged/repaired and issues arising from losing key skill-persons for whatever reason "But Ensign Ricky, you can't settle on the Planet Of Comic Book Cliches! You're the only one who knows how to clean the waste-to-cheeseburger coils in the replicator network!"

Enterprise, less flash in the pan "gee-wiz" and more character/political development. Can the Xindi arc, the beginnings of the Federation would have been much more intresting without a whole over-arching Bad Guy Bringing Everyone Together plot.

 

[Forbin]

Spock's death.

The lack of permanent death in TV, movie series and comics kinda fucked up my view of death growing up. "Aunt Dot's dead? Feh. She'll be back."

 

[Mysterion]

If I'd been in charge:

Spock would still be dead.

David Marcus would have lived.

Saavik would have been the traitor in ST6.

Picard would have come back from his "Chain of Command" torture experience in need of a lot of counseling taking place over multiple episodes, leving Jellico in command of Enterprise for awhile.

Voyager would have gotten progressively more damaged and run-down over the course of the series. Not all the Starfleet and Maquis would have gotten along. At least a couple major characters would not have survived to the series finale.

 

[RobertScorpio]

If I'd been in charge:

Spock would still be dead.

David Marcus would have lived.

Saavik would have been the traitor in ST6.

Picard would have come back from his "Chain of Command" torture experience in need of a lot of counseling taking place over multiple episodes, leving Jellico in command of Enterprise for awhile.

Voyager would have gotten progressively more damaged and run-down over the course of the series. Not all the Starfleet and Maquis would have gotten along. At least a couple major characters would not have survived to the series finale.

Ummm..if I ran Paramount, I would have said one thing...YOUR HIRED!!!

great list Mysterion...

Rob