I'd go to another galaxy.
Spoilers Where should Star Trek go next?
- Thread starter mattman8907
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Captain's log, stardate 43917.4: The Enterprise has been given the singular honor of hosting the first meeting between the Federation and a mysterious race known as the Legarans. We are in orbit around Vulcan, preparing to welcome aboard Federation Ambassador Sarek and his wife Perrin, who, like his first wife, is from Earth.
And then again for a brief scene in Unification.
I stand corrected.
I would be interested in this but I am not that interested in "Survival Trek." It's cool if there isn't a vast and entrenched support network and empire-like bureaucracy so the crew has to support themselves and get by on their wits, etc., but I am not interested in watching a Trek show where they're scrounging for supplies and worried about basic needs and survival all the time. Some of it is ok but I get tired of it in SF drama because unless the show is ending and everyone is mad behind the scenes we know that they're going to find what they need or close to it one way or another. An episode won't end with "the last ditch planet was a bust and the crew starved to death or whatever, Fin." so there's very little tension in it ultimately.
I realize that I am probably in the minority here.
You did not! But if it's a show about 1 ship in a new galaxy then that's the path of least resistance for writers. It could be neat if there's some sort of propulsion breakthrough or gimmick where they can do intergalactic travel quickly and then have to use good old warp speed when they get there and maybe there's a little proto-network of Starfleet ships exploring the new galaxy. DS9 was kind of heading this way with the Gamma Quadrant but the Dominion War arc swallowed everything.
Hi I’m picking up this thread toward then end so not pick on you or anything, but…
There are hundreds of billions of planets in the galaxy, maybe trillions, so there’s lots of room for exploration including in our own back yard.
Especially if you consider that a lot of alien life might be so alien as to not appear alive at all. I’d love to see future Trek tackle more interesting fare than the ubiquitous humanoid, even while including many more ubiquitous humanoids.
That is not the goal.
I'd much prefer a prequel about a young Jean-Luc Picard on the OG Stargazer over the Legacy idea.
A "Lost Era" series set between the launch of the Enterprise-B and "Encounter at Farpoint" would be preferable and a young Picard series set on the Stargazer fills that role nicely.
Only if we get to see this Academy outfit.
I think at least part of what people are attracted to with a Legacy show is a "Next Next Generation," a show that moves forward in the Trek timeline a bit, and embodies the central original premise of the franchise: exploring strange new worlds, seeking out new life and new civilizations, etc. More specifically, I think people are attracted to a more episodic structure with a variety of tones, stakes, etc. This is what attracts a lot of these same people to SNW, I think, but a NNG/Legacy show wouldn't have the bookends of requiring certain characters to meet certain ends as time goes on. Its more open-ended nature would allow more freedom and is not as limiting.
The biggest online criticism of a potential Legacy show is that it's too based on nostalgia but the fact is that the franchise has established a stable of beloved characters the audience is invested in and managed to set up interesting paths for the next generation of the characters. This is not a liability to me! TOS worked because of characters. TNG worked best when it shifted its focus to characters. DS9? Characters. A well-executed Legacy/NNG has a lot of built in strengths that could make for very good Trek.
That's not nostalgia.
That's what I expect from a series is good characters. You can start my interest initially with nostalgia but if there is no depth then nostalgia is not satisfactory.
I like Worf in season 3 because he was interesting, not because of warm fuzziness from TNG. I don't like Picard from TNG but like him more in Picard because of character.
There are more points but I'm in for Legacy if the goal is to develop characters and not a greatest hits parade of familiarity.
This is very subjectively applied though. Critics of PIC S3 dismiss it as paper-thin nostalgia. Others see depth in it because of their attachment to the characters and how their stories were progressed/wrapped in a much more satisfying way since NEM. Both camps set up a sort of inescapable rhetorical trap for the other: if you enjoyed PIC S3 it's because you're a sucker for nostalgia. If you didn't it's because you don't know what's good about the characters or why people enjoy them. My hunch is that the Venn diagram of people whose favorite series is not TNG and people who are lukewarm to hostile on PIC S3 is nearly a circle.
I am very attached to TNG and its characters and thus felt very happy about how S3 wrapped up because of what it afforded some of my favorite characters.
This is part of the trap...how could anyone prove the negative, that it would NOT be parade of familiarity? There is a reflexive hostility to familiarity but a long running franchise using mostly beloved legacy characters cannot avoid it.
Possibly but if one reads my criticism of S3 it's not just nostalgia but actively moving backwards for the characters. It feels regressive.
As I said, I enjoyed Worf in S3. Not because of any (if limited) affection for TNG. Not because of nostalgia for DS9.
The nostalgia becomes thin by putting pieces back.
And, again, this isn't just because of nostalgia. Using characters from the past can make sense if in service to current characters. Use of Spock in Unification made sense to a degree. Use of McCoy and Scotty did not, and did not do a service to either new characters or the old ones.
Yes, it is a fine balancing act but my critique of S3 cannot be boiled down to "nostalgia equal teh suck." It's how it is used and were it takes the characters. And where it took the characters was from a place of unfamiliarity, to a place of familiarity and saying that their best place was on the bridge of the Enterprise, and nothing will ever top that.
It started off well, but it used the same story telling elements as previous Picard seasons to lesser effect.
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