What Could Have Changed to Have Brought Back Enterprise?

[VulcanMindBlown]

A lot of things.

The idea of the Temporal Cold War would have been cool if it was a sub-plot, instead of the whole point of contension behind Enterprise. It could have explained to why so many people were coming from certain centuries, like the 22nd, and 26th (am I correct on that?) throughout the shows.

I understood the whole idea behind "space is scary and dangerous," but that wasn't how Trek was in its Golden Age of TNG.

I would suggest to keep it more based on pre-TOS, like Season 4 was. There were good ones like the "Shadow of P'Jem" and "The Andorran Incident," but it seemed that fans still weren't as positively reacting to the writing, though the conflicts still made sense.

Could we have written a show about something that happened before? I mean Trek is about moving forward. I am interested in the shows and books about what happened during the Kirk Era of the 23rd century and what happened to bring it to that time, but would it resonate with more casual fans? It seemed more like fan service. TOS is my favorite series, so I liked some of what ENT was trying to play back.

 

[Avro Arrow]

Brought it back... from cancellation? What would have probably needed to change for that to happen would be a fundamental change in the basics of economics.

But I tend to think if season one had been closer to what we saw in season four, the show might have lasted a full seven years.

 

[Nebusj]

But I tend to think if season one had been closer to what we saw in season four, the show might have lasted a full seven years.

That's the best idea I have, given what the show had to work with. The fourth season had a more creative energy than the first couple. And the various kisses to the fandom, 'These Are The Voyages' excepted, were well-received.

Of course, part of that was because of the fan perception that finally the people writing retread Voyager scripts had been kicked out and fresh new faces brought in. It's not like the first seasons were short of fandom nods; they were just received like they were peanut allergies.

 

[AdmiralShran]

The idea of the Temporal Cold War would have been cool if it was a sub-plot,

No, it never would be cool because it removes agency from the characters in the present and doesn't allow them to have their own motivations and political and ideological interests. One of the things that made Enterprise so bad was that everyone, including Archer, kept listening to spooky holograms from the future. There's no excuse for such lazy writing.

It's not like the first seasons were short of fandom nods; they were just received like they were peanut allergies.

I like Berman, he kept many great Star Trek series afloat, but he's listed on the writing credits of nearly every episode of Season 3... He just doesn't have it in him to make it at colorful as it needed to be. Almost all the crew of the Enterprise NX-01 were slightly less animated than Harry Kim.

 

[Mr J]

All it needed to do was debut seven years sooner and it would have lasted the whole seven years. But then we wouldn't have got seasons 3 and 4 in the form they were. Ratings being an actual worry for the first time in modern ST made the show better than it ever would have been otherwise IMO.

In more general terms - e.g. what the show needed to do differently from the outset to give it a better chance of sticking around - I would say really it just needed to embrace its format better. The storytelling is well-debated, but I actually think the problem was more the style. The format/look/acting style of ST basically hadn't really changed since TNG. Enterprise needed to be more modern, fresher. The stilted theatre-esque staging, acting and look needed to be more radically different to TNG, DS9 and VOY to modernise it for a new, younger audience.

Basically - it needed to do what Abrams did.

I really enjoyed Enterprise - but it never managed that. It was a good form of the 90's era ST model but wasn't new enough to fight off the franchise fatigue.

 

[AdmiralShran]

I really enjoyed Enterprise - but it never managed that. It was a good form of the 90's era ST model but wasn't new enough to fight off the franchise fatigue.

No - you have it backwards - most of Enterprise was like daytime soap acting... This is theater/stage acting:

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Of course, the character lends itself to hyperbole - but you can see the theater all over Combs in how much he moves his head and arms and his overly strong body movements. You will frequently notice the same thing from other stage actors like Stewart and Brooks.

It was not franchise fatigue, it was bad storytelling, not very impressive directing, overly restrained acting, and a theme song that made you want to change the channel every time you heard it. Blalock's breasts are not impressive enough to keep Enterprise afloat when her character is far less Vulcan and far more "angry, snobby, and bitter shrew." Compared to Saavik or Valeris, she's human - not Vulcan.

 

[Mr J]

/\ Point taken. Theatre-style is probably not the right word - but the theatre-stage style is definitely there in pretty much all modern ST. It wasn't as 'free' as most modern television and it was dated by the time Enterprise came about. It is also about the filming/static cam style - not exactly dynamic in the modern TV age, and it gives 90's > 00's Trek a stage feel that most modern TV just doesn't have any more.

And it was franchise fatigue more than anything - caused by the fact that none of the spin-offs post TNG built or even maintained the audience. If Enterprise swapped places with Voyager or DS9 in the chronology, it would have gone seven years. Deep Space Nine and Voyager would have been cancelled if they were in Enterprise's place. The ratings were tumbling every year from Deep Space Nine onwards, which is pretty much all the evidence anybody should need that none of them were appealling to new audiences. None of them were new, exciting or different enough to fight off the fatigue - as much as I loved a lot of elements of all of them. People hail DS9 as the best thing in modern ST (which I agree with) - but it fared no better than Voyager or Enterprise in terms of continually dwindling ratings. Even the risks that show took weren't dramatic enough to appeal to a modern audience.

By the time Enterprise came about, the whole franchise needed a major overhaul from the ground-up. They needed to shake-off and revamp the template of TNG completely in terms of storytelling, writing, acting, visuals, musical style - everything. Which is exactly what Abrams ended up doing.

 

[2takesfrakes]

Had the $ave Enterprise Campaign been successful AND if the series had taken the opportunity to "reboot" the format of the show, to better reflect the century it was made in, the combination of the two could've made the fifth season's ratings solid enough to justify the Season Six and even if the ratings fell some, a 7th season would've probably still been possible, even likely. But quite aside from all of that, the fact that vocal Trekkies made their disdain for the show known, I suspect it kind of turned the uninitiated off a bit, like -ENTERPRISE- wasn't delivering the best of what made STAR TREK so famous. It's not really a help gaining a new, or greater, audience, when the show has a reputation for having screwed up.

 

[AdmiralShran]

And it was franchise fatigue more than anything - caused by the fact that none of the spin-offs post TNG built or even maintained the audience. If Enterprise swapped places with Voyager or DS9 in the chronology, it would have gone seven years. Deep Space Nine and Voyager would have been cancelled if they were in Enterprise's place.

Look at the first season blip for Enterprise - it was not franchise fatigue that killed Enterprise. People wanted to watch Star Trek. Most importantly, they wanted to watch good Star Trek. Instead they got Archer and his band of really depressing crewmates.

Even Deep Space Nine is more lively than Enterprise and DS9 is dark and depressing (for Trek).

It is true that "Franchise Fatigue" (which is really: "you have no strong white male characters in DS9 or VOY who are TNG's primary audience" fatigue (it's quite evident by the fact that Enterprise has 3 lead white males that they realized this problem - but that can't fix boring)) killed Star Trek in general - but Enterprise itself was killed by being so far from the franchise and so weak in writing that it wasn't bearable. Archer is cringeworthy confused in almost everything he does in Enterprise - it doesn't feel like a strong captain but a chicken running around with his head cut off. This is most evident when he, for no reason whatsoever, helps rescue Klingons from the Cabal like Starfleet and Klingons are supposed to be best of buds during this time period.

 

[Mr J]

I think that graph actually shows exactly what I am saying - look at the trend from the end of TNG. Really interesting to see actually as the decline from DS9 through to the end of ENT is at a pretty consistent rate.

Enterprise just did the exact same thing DS9 and VOY did - fail to do anything to either maintain or grow the audience that was at its peak during TNG's run, hence the fatigue comment. Each new spin-off attracted a decent number for the pilot, but each then continued the decline throughout their runs - pretty much showing that there was still initial interest there, but most weren't interested enough in what they were seeing with any of the spin-offs to stick around over their runs.

Goes to show that none of the spin-offs post TNG did anything to revive the franchise from the downward spiral - as much as you may not like to hear that, the numbers speak for themselves. It isn't a reflection on what we perceive as 'quality' ST.

If ENT had started when DS9 did, ENT would have gone 7 years and DS9 four. If ENT came when VOY did it would have run seven years and VOY 4. The fact is that most outside of the core ST fandom saw all of them as interchangable. Thats why Abrams came along and gave the whole franchise a kick up the backside - and it worked.

 

[T'Girl]

I've often wonder what would have happened if the producers and the writers had fully embraced the concept of the Temporal Cold War, instead of endlessly bitching that it was being imposed upon them.

 

[Bry_Sinclair]

DS9 had great stories, compelling characters, good actors and a more 'realistic' atmosphere, so I doubt it would've been cancelled in its 4th year. It had a less-than-stellar first season but most shows do, plus the PTB were still trying to figure out how to write for a station instead of a ship. Once they found their stride then they were off. ENT didn't have that excuse, seeing as how four other series were ship-based for them to draw upon.

 

[AdmiralShran]

I've often wonder what would have happened if the producers and the writers had fully embraced the concept of the Temporal Cold War, instead of endlessly bitching that it was being imposed upon them.

No, it's completely ridiculous. There's no way to make that work. You have to let a show's characters drive its action and having people from the future showing up to boss everyone around is just annoying. Janeway had it right when the Temporal Agent showed up and she ordered Tuvok to shoot him.

 

[AdmiralShran]

DS9 had great stories, compelling characters, good actors and a more 'realistic' atmosphere, so I doubt it would've been cancelled in its 4th year. It had a less-than-stellar first season but most shows do, plus the PTB were still trying to figure out how to write for a station instead of a ship. Once they found their stride then they were off. ENT didn't have that excuse, seeing as how four other series were ship-based for them to draw upon.

As I said, they alienated their primary viewer-base by pretty much tossing all white males out the airlock while I'm guessing TNG was watched by primarily white males. We were left with Chief O'Brien in DS9 who is a good character in his own light - but also kind of a depressing character - but some people will relate to him about as much as I relate to Tom Paris which is absolutely not at all. You can count "Odo" I guess, but he's not human even though he acts like a really grouchy one. In Voyager all you have is Tom Paris.

By contrast, NCIS, for example, has all the diversity of neoconservative convention and has absolutely dominated the ratings. So they didn't find a middle ground between being diverse and being so diverse that you alienate your primary viewerbase that isn't super hip on ensuring every character they enjoy isn't a white male. Obviously not all the viewerbase will fall off if you cast almost no major white male roles into a show like Star Trek, but some certainly will.

That's the unfortunate reality... Trek fans are apparently pretty white...

I watched TNG as a kid and I didn't watch much DS9, much of VOY or ENT until after they were off the air. I don't really remember why I didn't - I think I was just mostly pretty young when those shows were on and I didn't watch them much because my parents didn't.

 

[Terok Nor]

Nothing could save it. Enterprise is a dud. It's the redheaded stepchild of the Star Trek franchise.

 

[dahj]

If Netflix had been a thing back then it might have gotten another season.

 

[Long Syntax]

I actually agree with Mr J's assertion that ENT would have been successful had it aired in the previous spin offs time-frames. The graph of the ratings could be interpreted to support that assertion as well. There was a recent article that explored the phenomenon of a recent uptick in interest in ENT and a renewed appreciation. It seems the fan fatigue is now run its course and folks are willing to revisit ENT and see it in a renewed way. In the end I believe ENT was a victim of timing more that anything substantively wrong with the writing or acting (remember, all the series have their stinkers)

 

[suarezguy]

It's interesting Season 4, though more popular with some fans, overall barely stopped the decline in viewers.

I think the things that would have most helped the show is cut way down on the technobabble (one of the reasons to do a prequel and very quickly abandoned if even attempted), give the crewmembers more personality and even conflict and yet have Archer be flawed (maybe a little more than what was onscreen) yet overall more impressive.
Archer was intended to be Kirk/Han Solo-like and that could have worked but I think Berman & Braga tended to write and Bakula to play him instead as a dry moralizer and/or a bumbler.
It's also interesting that The West Wing was very successful around the same era despite having a pretty idealistic/preachy tone (though it could have been less successful if it had also started after 9/11 rather than two years earlier).

Blalock's breasts are not impressive enough to keep Enterprise afloat when her character is far less Vulcan and far more "angry, snobby, and bitter shrew." Compared to Saavik or Valeris, she's human - not Vulcan.

And yet the more emotional, volatile, humanlike new Spock was pretty well received or at least didn't keep 09 from being successful and ID doing OK.

 

[Nyotarules]

DS9 had great stories, compelling characters, good actors and a more 'realistic' atmosphere, so I doubt it would've been cancelled in its 4th year. It had a less-than-stellar first season but most shows do, plus the PTB were still trying to figure out how to write for a station instead of a ship. Once they found their stride then they were off. ENT didn't have that excuse, seeing as how four other series were ship-based for them to draw upon.

ITA Deep space nine is the best of the franchise, including TOS, its a real ensemble piece. TOS most of love for sentimental reasons, but some of the storylines were ludicrious. As a female I cringe and laugh everytime I watch TOS episdoe. Great characters but so Americancentric and sexist.

 

[Nyotarules]

As I said, they alienated their primary viewer-base by pretty much tossing all white males out the airlock while I'm guessing TNG was watched by primarily white males. We were left with Chief O'Brien in DS9 who is a good character in his own light - but also kind of a depressing character - but some people will relate to him about as much as I relate to Tom Paris which is absolutely not at all. You can count "Odo" I guess, but he's not human even though he acts like a really grouchy one. In Voyager all you have is Tom Paris.

By contrast, NCIS, for example, has all the diversity of neoconservative convention and has absolutely dominated the ratings. So they didn't find a middle ground between being diverse and being so diverse that you alienate your primary viewerbase that isn't super hip on ensuring every character they enjoy isn't a white male. Obviously not all the viewerbase will fall off if you cast almost no major white male roles into a show like Star Trek, but some certainly will.

That's the unfortunate reality... Trek fans are apparently pretty white...

I watched TNG as a kid and I didn't watch much DS9, much of VOY or ENT until after they were off the air. I don't really remember why I didn't - I think I was just mostly pretty young when those shows were on and I didn't watch them much because my parents didn't.

Its ironic that a show that promotes a future Utopian Earth where our past and present day skin colour and gendar issues have disppeared has to pander to mainly white males or they won't watch the show. I don't know whether to laugh or cry.