Create a new series premise

[Nate the Great]

A sort-of game. Come up with an idea for a new Star Trek series that's actually NEW. By "new" I mean no Enterprise, space stations or marooned starships.

I'll get the inevitable Starfleet Academy series idea out of the way up front. Some of you guys think that it'd never work, "Saved by the Bell in Space," so to speak. I think otherwise. Remember that the Academy isn't JUST the main campus in San Francisco. These cadets go all over the world for field trips, train for weeks in the asteroid belt, no doubt they study abroad on Vulcan or Andor for a semester once in awhile. What about cadets that are from new member worlds, or even totally foreign governments? Remember that anyone from a non-Federation world can apply with a command officer recommendation. How would their upbringing compare and contrast with the standard Federation mindset? What about cadets that aren't young whippersnappers? In the wonderful book Sarek, Kirk's nephew Peter started at the Academy when he was almost thirty. He would've had experiences that younger guys wouldn't have had. How about someone who grew up in a colony ship, like that guy from NX-01? Suddenly moving from a small, isolated society to Earth would be quite a paradigm shift. Or go the other way; a character who grew up in a very closely-knit multigenerational household, suddenly having to only deal with one other person.

[NAHTMMM]

I think this could make for an excellent, timely (mini-)series.

Could, mind you. In reality the people producing it would almost inevitably screw up pretty badly, of course. But it could work wonders.

Here's the basic premise:

"And so the problem is this." Admiral Whitestone had had 84 years of life during which to practice stern expressions, and he seemed to put every day of practice into effect now as he looked each of the officers in the eye. "Very simply, every one of those eight planetoids is showing signs of impending depletion of the vorbium ore deposits."

"Ah. So that means less varbium," said Lubbock, jumping ahead as a bright, attention-paying Starfleet Officer should do.

"Less varbium would be mined, yes," agreed Whitestone, [...] "but as I said, that byproduct can be replicated to some extent. The true problem is the vorbium itself. It is one of those few substances which we still have yet to successfully replicate--in fact, I believe that we have not yet fully understood its structure, correct, Science Officer?"

[...]

"And yet, ironically, vorbium is essential to replicator technology, correct, Chief Engineer?"

"To modern replicator technology, yes." [...] "It's used in the construction process and in repairs to certain criticial components and subsystems. If the Federation were to totally lack any vorbium at all . . . well, sir, our lives would be severely disrupted. To say the very least. The existing replicators could continue to function for as long as they didn't need any repairs requiring vorbium, but after they all broke down we'd be left with prior replicator technology. The difference would be, oh . . . like the difference between modern warp drive and pre-dilithium warp drive that could barely make Warp 4."

"That is perhaps an overstatement, Chief Engineer," Whitestone said, "but you have summed the situation up well otherwise. Certainly there would be many Federation citizens who would agree with you. Vorbium technology has made possible the super-efficient replicators we depend upon today, and without the precision and other qualities those replicators afford, we would be unable to replicate many medicines, biomolecules, nanites, construction materials, experimental chemicals, and much more." A slight pause. "I trust you all understand the potential difficulties this presents us."

Social commentary in Star Trek? Whodathunkit?

"[...] We don't expect you to find any vorbium in the sector you will be exploring, but when you take into account that we have only ever detected it in abundance in thirteen planetoids in a grand total of nine star systems, you will understand that we can't afford to miss a single planet where it may be found. Also, you'll be doing a good deal of active scanning in a sector that borders space disputed by a race that, as rumors would have it, is working on a new superweapon."

Potential for big funky technobabble battles in Star Trek? Whodathunkit?

[Gatac]

I know it has potential to suffer extreme amounts of prequelitis, but here's my pitch:

Remember when Zefram Cochrane shook hands with the first Vulcan he'd ever seen after his warp flight? Yeah, we all cheered. That was great.

But what now?

The world's in shambles, we're still getting used to the fact that there's aliens, and just what the hell are supposed to do about it? So much to do...so much to explore...and not two people who agree on how to do it.

This is mankind's greatest test - beyond experiments, beyond propaganda missions, beyond trials and scientific trivia. This is when we reach out for the stars.

I wonder what's out there...

Gatac

[Nate the Great]

I'm not sure if I like the vorbium idea. There are too many shows already that rely on a basic premise of "we need to find MacGuffin X at all costs."

Second Idea:

A starship assigned to a new species. First Contact was only a year or so ago, and the natives still don't really understand Peace, Justice, and the Federation Way yet. Their culture, while not completely rigid, is extremely resistant to change. They have some moderately valuable resource. Certainly nothing that would cause the Romulans or somebody to declare war on the Federation for, but definately good enough to send in some spies and operatives, both known and unknown. Perhaps a safer variant of the ever-valuable bio-mimetic gel. Our starship crew is moderately isolated. Backup is perhaps a few days away, and even subspace transmissions will take hours to get a reply for. We've got to protect this resource, convince the natives to join the Federation, and keep the adversary away. In the meantime, this is still a new region of space, and there are other planets to explore. Perhaps one of them has a species with more technology but fewer resources. Some form of discrimination is preventing these two peoples from cooperating. Spies are sent back and forth to steal information or raw materials, depending on the direction. They won't work together, partially due to Romulan interferance. How can we bring them into the Federation?

[NAHTMMM]

The vorbium isn't a single item (which I suspect differentiates it from some of the "MacGuffin" examples I can think of, like BSG), and it wouldn't be the sole storyline (ideally) in the series. In the part I linked to, I've already set up various character relationships and potential factions and so on that only touch on the vorbium issue in passing.


Yours is a very interesting idea as well, one that would probably bring up a lot of the same sort of situations as mine.

[Nate the Great]

It just occured to me that it doesn't even HAVE to be the Federation. Pocket Books has published a series set aboard a Klingon starship. Granted, a series based around that would be A. Horribly expensive in terms of makeup, B. Horribly niche-based. Would anyone OTHER than a Trekkie want to dive into Klingon politics and interpersonal relationships?

Or how about a Federation starship that actually has humans as the minority faction? There are plenty of alien makeups that aren't too involved. Think about it. Vulcans, Rigellians, Bajorans, Betazoids. If we had, say, a Rigellian in command, he'd have a vastly different mindset than a human. What command choices would be different? There'd be cultural influences that we've never seen before affecting the plot.

I'd still like to see a series based in the TOS-timeline on another Constitution-class starship. We could have our remaining TOS actors cameo via audio transmissions. Perhaps there was a ship that sort of followed the Big E around, doing "cleanup," so to speak. What DID happen to our favorite TOS races after Kirk left? After all, when properly done, even the technology of the mid-23rd century was particularly effective. Besides, 1701 was in the Beta Quadrant a lot ("we're the only starship in the quadrant"), what was happening closer to home? We could see the setting up of the Nimbus III agreement. Perhaps see a preliminary design for Excelsior. When was the big breakthough in transwarp? Whose stupid idea were the grey pajamas?

Having greatly enjoyed the novel Sarek, I'd think even a series based on a Federation ambassador and his staff might be cool. Let's see the ambassador/starship captain interaction from the other side. Is there a traitor in his staff? What cultural snafus are still waiting to be made?