• Welcome! The TrekBBS is the number one place to chat about Star Trek with like-minded fans.
    If you are not already a member then please register an account and join in the discussion!

What would an Enterprise Prequel be like?

You could do something very much like The Expanse. Maybe a battle between different interests, with the holdouts from United Earth battling the initial version of Starfleet within the solar system for control.
 
You could do something very much like The Expanse. Maybe a battle between different interests, with the holdouts from United Earth battling the initial version of Starfleet within the solar system for control.

What species would humanity be aware of in that era?
 
i think it would be a strange star trek show without any star ships with humans.... but it could be an interesting drama if it was about the trouble between Vulcans and humans, a story about a selfcontrolled logical alien race trying to integrate them self's into the human society. Some humans would be inspired by the stoic Vulcans, and some Vulcans would be inspired be the wild crazy humans, but mostly it would be confrontations, and of course, we would need some interspecies love stories too.
 
I don't see a fractured geopolitical solar system with the United Earth vs. Mars vs. Belters. ENT depicts humanity as one united government. Any human opposition comes from splinter cells or terrorist groups or extremists.

Now, having said that, could such extremists carry the antagonist role for multiple seasons?

There were Earth colonies before ENT. Mayweather worked on his family's freighter and made runs to Trillius Prime and he had first, second, and third hand experience with the women from Draylax.

Among the planets visited by the Earth Cargo Service were Draylax, both Teneebian moons, Trillius Prime, Vega colony, Deneva colony, and presumably Earth. (ENT: "Broken Bow", "Fortunate Son", "Horizon") Trade also existed with the Demerians and the Orions. (ENT: "Horizon").

So, the Orions were known.

The SS Conestoga was an Earth colony ship that was in service with the Space Agency in the mid-21st century. Launched from Earth in 2069, only six years after Zefram Cochrane's warp flight, the transport's mission was the colonization of Terra Nova, a nearby class M planet. The Conestoga was capable of carrying approximately two-hundred colonists, and was equipped for long-term travel. The Conestoga was commanded by Captain Mitchell.

The Conestoga took nine years, traveling just above warp 1, to reach Terra Nova. Once the Conestoga reached the planet, in 2078, its modules were dismantled to form the colony's initial structures and buildings. (ENT: "Terra Nova")

Im sure there were other Conestoga type ships.
 
I don't see a fractured geopolitical solar system with the United Earth vs. Mars vs. Belters. ENT depicts humanity as one united government. Any human opposition comes from splinter cells or terrorist groups or extremists.
Per TNG’s “Attached,” United Earth didn’t hold claim to representing the entire planet until 2150, only one year before the NX-01 Enterprise was launched. That’s almost 90 YEARS after first contact for humanity to form a unified world government.

Also, Q’s court of post-atomic horrors in “Encounter at Farpoint” is set in 2079, more than a decade after first contact. So it seemed to take a while to get all of humanity on the same page, and there was probably some conflicts and power struggles in getting there.
 
Human wars and conflicts go millennia back in our history. Then at some specific point in time, suddenly humans decided to finally unify for the first time in history.
That is something that surely have to be explained, because that is certainly against our primitive nature and instincts. Human nature and aggressive instincts have led us to countless wars and devastations, and still we kept on doing that again and again.
For us to finally abandon our instincts and bad behavior, something truly unique has to have happened, and I am not referring to the warp capability, or to the Vulcans, after the First Contact.
I am referring to something more powerful. Inexplicable for the moment, and surely something that has to be explained.
 
I thought a bit about a sequel and prequel to "First Contact" while also incorporating the 21st century parts of the novel "Federation." Have Cochrane, Micah Brack and John Burke, and also Lily and new characters. It would probably be less a Star Trek series and more a Zefram Cochrane series and I thought of it as either a comic book or novel in the style of what Greg Cox did with "Eugenics Wars." It's not too long after First Contact the event that Connestoga and Valiant are launched so they could play in the background, along with Friendship 1. You could have people dealing with the existence of aliens and what that means. How do people respond to help? Can you do something about reconstruction and getting into removing radiation and how people would react to that? One of things I wonder about from the First Contact first draft is that there was a very basic replicator introduced that helped feed the starving masses. I'm thinking it just barely makes something like the slop they made on the algae planet in BSG. Did that happen in the real universe or were they still growing crops? If they did, how does that impact jobs and restarting a global economy. Is that even worth getting into? Bill McKay's Stargate books would do little side stories about events going on around Abydos or Earth, like how people outside the main characters are affected by events, and then go back to the main storylines and I quite liked that.
Even if you went say 50 years after that (and 40 years before Enterprise) I think you could still do some interesting stories but less about exploring strange new worlds but something I'd imagine a bit like the universe of Alien where it's very basic and one wrong move could end in disaster.
 
The Martian War of Independence takes place during the pre-ENT timeframe. We could explore the Sol system in detail, using current knowledge.
 
Ringships and the laying down of some spacelanes with a runaway accident keeping early Earth warp-probes grounded until things calmed down—maybe the spaceripper craft powered by a captured Omega point molecule with protomatter.

Think Space 1999’s Breakaway

This accident cut Earth off for a bit, flung Valiant to the galactic edge…but stabilized and allowed space lanes to more safely be laid down. Nacelle ships were encouraged to fly to either side of the lanes two at a time…nacelles pointed at one another to thread the needle and stabilize things.

The accident forced Vulcan to get more involved. They were afraid this rang the dinner bell for the Vegan tyranny…extinct, but some berzerkers left over.

Think Orion’s Arm.
 
Last edited:
Per TNG’s “Attached,” United Earth didn’t hold claim to representing the entire planet until 2150, only one year before the NX-01 Enterprise was launched....

Also, Q’s court of post-atomic horrors in “Encounter at Farpoint” is set in 2079, more than a decade after first contact....

The Martian War of Independence takes place during the pre-ENT timeframe. We could explore the Sol system in detail, using current knowledge.

Hmm. Interesting points. Thanks! I'll have to rethink this now...
 
Scrappy little Boomer ship, plying the space lanes between Earths early colonies and alien trading partners. Maybe make the ship the ECS Horizon.
 
I'd love to see this show (if done right). There's a ton of brand new stories (for Trek) that could be told. It could even be more Stargate SG-1 like, with teams of humans going on bold explorations and getting over their head quite a bit. Arguging with Vulcans. The tech is primitive (compared to TNG), no Shields, no transporters, no replicators. The people would be much more like us than the "evolved" humanity of TNG's time.
 
A prequel would have to start out in the Sol system for its first season before stories could take place far away from the Sol system. To at least understand the context the main characters are established in.
  • The last war among humans, on Mars, would be occurring at the turn of the century; the creation of the Fundamental Declaration of the Martian Colonies would be the likely outcome. The War for Martian Independence could possibly play a role in the origin story of the MACOs.
  • Poverty, hunger & disease would still be present, though on the way out. Cancer would be cured at the start of the series with cytolytic injections. The Ozone would be either repaired or nearly repaired.
  • Colonizing Alpha Centauri - which may or may not have an indigenous humanoid species living on the planet - would be a priority.
  • Development of Jupiter Station would be another priority.
  • The first freighter lanes being established (ex. Luna-Mars-Europa-Titan-Pluto-Alpha Centauri), with dilithium being the major commodity
  • Unsolved murders by Redjac on Mars would spawn ghost stories, a freighter tradition.
  • Lily Sloane would be a VIP due to her work and association with Zefram Cochrane. John Burke would be a VIP due to his work at the Royal Academy. Pyong Ko is either a VIP or memorialized for his work on cancer. A.E. Hodgkin would be in the early stages of developing Hodgkin’s Law in regards to parallel Earth and might be making his way to the Gagarin Radiation Belt. Henry Archer would still be an undergrad, possibly at Princeton University. Emory Erickson would be developing what becomes the transporter.
  • Europe would be moving towards a European Hegemony and in turn a one world government, and would be rebuilding Paris among other European cities. Gaullists and Neo-Trotskyites might be political factions that still exist in Europe.
  • The United States would still exist, and would be rebuilding NYC and DC, among US cities, and would be trying to retain influence in a multipolar world. There would be a reckoning in regard to its history in the 21st century (capitalist practices and anti-union practices, Sanctuary Districts, Second Civil War, Colonel Green’s eco-terrorists), though its advances in space exploration would be seen as a positive (Europa mission, Ares missions to Mars, development of warp drive). As would advanced in cybernetics (Jackson Roykirk). The US President in the series might be the African American female that is the fifth face on Mount Rushmore.
  • The Eastern Coalition and the Pan-Caribbean government would still exist. Brazil would be building Amazon University. The Soviet Union might be reformed. Australia would be hyper nationalist and reluctant to join any world government at the start of the series. The United States of Africa might be already formed before the European Hegemony. Canada, Mexico, Venezuela, & Japan may have their own space agencies or be pushing for a global space agency.
  • While early 21st century media & entertainment would be persevered, there would be lamentations of the loss of mid-21st century media & entertainment. Holographic entertainment would be in its infancy.
  • The Royal Academy would be a major scientific institution as Earth rebuilds.
  • 21st century neo-fascist factions would be on the way out and would be morphing into Earth First groups.
  • Failed colonies would be commonplace (droughts, plagues, resource poor planets, natural disasters (comet/meteor strikes/solar flares), predators). Those that are successful are based around mining, scientific research, and/or archeology.
  • No Earth ship goes faster than warp 2; sublight extremely common, there would be no anti-gravity, and ships/space stations would rely on cryogenics. Vulcan ships go to warp 7 and are the fastest ships in the known galaxy. Combined Human-Vulcan crews are very short lived. Humans would at least try to steal Vulcan state secrets to gain a level playing field in space exploration.
  • Space modules with cryogenics would occasionally be discovered; with it being a struggle to integrate 20th and 21st century humans with the new 22nd century society.
  • Vulcan establishing an embassy on Earth and debating permitting Earth to join the Interspecies Medical Exchange would be a huge arc.
In terms of aliens humans would encounter:

Unidentified pirates: Orions, Andorians, Tellarites, Mazarites, Osaarians, maybe Ktarians
Official first contacts: Denobulans, Ithenites, Rigelians, Nausicaans (first identified pirates), possibly Draylaxians, possibly Teneebians
Unofficially first contacts: Coridanites, Deltans, maybe Vissians, maybe Suliban, maybe Enolians
Known species: Vulcans, Kzinti

Romulans would also be in the series, clandestinely messing with Vulcan-human relations to create doubts, as well as disappearing humans cargo and colony ships by kamikazeing them.

I think the best way to make the first season exciting would be to take a Top Gun: Maverick approach.
 
Last edited:
If you are not already a member then please register an account and join in the discussion!

Sign up / Register


Back
Top