What would a modern Enterprise series look like?

I loved season 3 of Enterprise, and while I didn't think as highly of 4 as some, it was still a decent show at that point. It was a shame it was cancelled.

I'm not sure there's much reason to pick up where the show left off though, unless it's for a one off limited series covering the Romulan War or something. Strange New Worlds is doing the regular Star Trek thing and doing it well, so it would need to be something that really justified returning to the setting.

If I could wipe Enterprise from history and start over, I think I'd have liked it to lean more into the low tech stuff and make that the hook. The show very quickly seemed to drop that side of things, and even early on it mostly just replaced later Trek stuff with other stuff that did the same job. Polarised hull playing replaced shields, lasers replaced phasers etc. They even had a transporter. I'd like to see humanity taking its first steps to the stars without any of that stuff.

An issue with bringing back enterprise would be that it's literally been almost 20 years since season 4 premiered. They can do a time skip that takes place later in the 22nd century and show some early federation stories. Or they could follow another ship during the Romulan war, but it would be difficult for them to just start up with season 5 and try to carry on like normal.

I remember there was some hope that the series would come back in the age of streaming in the late 00s early 10s, but eventually the march of time makes that difficult.

I did enjoy enterprise though. It had its faults but overall was a quality series. There's a book series that acts as a season 5 and beyond that sort of covers the romulan war era which I thought was pretty solid when I read it in the early 10s. I believe it was The Good that Men Do, Kobayashi Maru, and then romulan war books

the thing about Enterprise is even at its worst, it’s not an entirely bad show - the supporting cast is good, they are set in an interesting time period, and the premise is ostensibly interesting.

The main problem for me is that, setting aside the fact that the main theme comes straight from the Patch Adams soundtrack, the show is straight up boring. They came so close to something really interesting with Archer being flawed because he was the first, and perhaps even not really the right guy to be captain. But then the writers had to make him a mary sue, he fails is way to success every episode, and becomes like the ship’s alcoholic dad, constantly getting into the dumbest yelling arguments with his wife first officer — who he is also canonically racist against by the way. You would think/hope they were setting him up for some growth on that, but, instead they chose to try to make a lot of the show indirectly relevant to 9/11

By the time the show finally set the stage to become interesting the majority of its audience had already been alienated

What Paramount ought to realize about it is that Enterprise failed because of the writers and producers and not because of the cast or setting and it should not be very difficult to do significantly better than the original

Sometimes I feel like I’m part of the minority who actually enjoyed Enterprise.

I adore it. Archer is probably my favorite series Captain, but that comes from my love of Scott Bakula & Quantum Leap more than the writing.

I think it's an underrated show, and was mostly dragged down due to it's strange choice of music and intro sequence.

series 5

You'd have to do a time skip given the actors' age.

The main focus could be Lorian - the son of T'Pol and Trip. He had appeared in an ENT episode from an alternate timelines.

The background could be that T'Pol used Trip's DNA to get pregnant with Lorian (Dr. Phlox hints some science is required for Humans and Vulcans to reproduce in Lorian's ENT episode, for reference). She always wanted to be a mother and chose Trip as a logical donor.

Since T'Pol and Trip had a psychic link, he appears to her in a form only she can see. Similar to Dr. Balter & Six in BSG. Or Al in Quantum Leap.

T'Pol spends her later career as a science expert, being called from planet to planet solving mysteries.

T'Pol struggles with grief in her own way and questions whether seeing Trip is a sign of mental illness or rather that Trip somehow lives on, truly, through her. They'd even argue about it. She doesn't tell anyone - out of embarrassment or fear. But she'd say it's illogical to discuss it until she understands it better. The show could drop red herring hints. Perhaps Trip reveals something to T'Pol she didn't know, only for the audience to be revealed that information was always accessible, in the background.

Meanwhile, Lorian gets his first commission on Enterprise and climbs the ranks. Because he's mixed race, he deals with a lot of prejudice along the way. The story could get a lot more detailed, revealing separatist movements, even amongst some Starfleet members wishing to leave the Federation. Or rather would prefer a defensive agreement over integration. Lorian balances the idealistic image of a hero Starfleet father he never knew - with the realities of being part of a pluralistic society that's still learning to accepting new cultures and overcome it's biases.

More of a spin-off, really.

First season set in 2164. Episodes include depicting the events I linked. Second season in 2165, same deal, depict all these events plus whatever new stuff the writers dream up. By filling in existing canon, half the seasons stories become really easy to break, saving time and money, and people who respect canon will have nothing to complain about. Ten year time jump explains why the actors look older. The only problem is no Trip, but he can easily cameo in a dream story or an alternate timeline, heck they could even Harry Kim him back to life.

edit: added bonus, there's an opportunity to retcon and apologize for Code Of Honor.

I’d also love for it to come back but it seems a bit impossible by now haha.

Also despite the controversy with the “holoprogram” and the unnecessary death and so on… I thought ending the show with the founding of the Federation was actually super awesome. I don’t know how they’d fold a new Enterprise season into that either but yeah.

Great show, shit opening theme song.

I'm going to ignore trying to keep the existing Enterprise and instead go for a reboot using the same actors, as the problems with the original wasn't the acting talent.

There is no Temporal Cold War. Anything sneaky happening in the background is the Romulans, but this doesn't become known until later in the show. Hell, you can keep the creepy communications with the Suliban if you want as it still allows for a Big Bad. You just don't get any good guys helping out Archer.

If we are going to give Archer the Pike treatment, it is going to be that Archer's idea is that his success in life is going to be delivering the Warp 5 program, and maybe even the Warp 7 program in the future. Being Captain of the Enterprise is considered by Archer to be a way to help understand what a ship is going to need in future iterations. His rejecting of the call is going to be that Robinson is going to get the future Archer wanted, but Archer is going to have the future that humanity needs.

Keep shows like P'Jem, as they really help show how humanity is becoming more involved in local affairs. Maybe the Enterprise accidentally ruins some small Romulan plots to destabilize the area.

Include a show here about an earlier Vulcan intervention into a post-warp civilization that went badly, with news of the problems getting to Earth

Make the Vulcan revolution a much longer series, including possibly including the Andorians attempting a post-revolution invasion of Vulcan space when Vulcan is weak to secure an advantage over their weakened foe. Archer can step into this as well, as there may be a second Romulus plot to try to replace the liberated government with something else that will be aligned to merge with Romulus in the future.

Back on Earth, the coup attempt is a way to get Earth to seal itself off and focus on improving the lives of humans. Make the rebuilding of humanity uneven and a work in progress. Some of humanity may not want to spend money galavanting across the stars and instead use the resources to focus on rebuilding Earth. Have Archer see that a post-coup attempt Earth is starting to the way of the Vulcan High Command. He intervenes with the Enterprise, creating the first opportunity to lead Earth politics, even if it is just to get through a crisis.

Have some other crises happen, eventually leading to an Earth-Romulus War, with Archer now having to be on the front lines.

This could probably be done with the current leadership of Star Trek, given how they are writing Discovery and Strange New Worlds.