Title: Coto's Plans For Season 5
Crichton Kicks - February 24, 2005 11:20 PM (GMT)
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"I don't for a moment believe Star Trek needs a break. In fact I think we need more Star Trek," executive producer Manny Coto said during a Q&A last night in which he discussed fan efforts to save Enterprise and his own wishes for the next incarnation of the franchise. "I would be happy to be doing Star Trek for the rest of my life."
The TrekUnited-hosted chat, which was posted in full by a SaveEnterprise.com administrator at the TrekBBS, included Coto's plans for a fifth season, which he said would include the founding of the first starbase, a visit to Phlox's home planet of Denobula and a more complete look at the founding of the United Federation of Planets. He also imagined revisiting the Mirror universe, "almost a series within a series", as well as a multi-episode arc set in the city of Stratos from the original series' "The Cloud Minders."
Coto added that he felt enough had been said about the Temporal Cold War - "I felt a heavy reliance on time travel at the beginning of Enterprise" - but was hoping to address the issue of time travel again in a fifth season. He declined to identify the mysterious shadowy being from the Suliban arc, nicknamed "Future Guy", in case the storyline should be picked up again. Perhaps his biggest bombshell in terms of the future of Enterprise was his statement that if the series continued, he wanted to get Shran onto the Enterprise crew.
Though he said he would not really advise another prequel, Coto said that he would be interested in exploring the period during the Star Trek feature films after the original Enterprise's five-year mission has ended, which would presumably explore the developments and changes between the first Star Trek series and The Next Generation. "However, I'd recommend for the next series going to the 25th century because I feel that Star Trek should move forward," he added.
On the subject of whether Star Trek needs a break, the exec said that he believes there is still an audience for the show, as evidenced by the efforts to keep it on the air and by the fact that ratings are likely underreported since fans download and TiVO episodes as well as watching them when they air. The problem, he noted, "has to do with promotion...I don't know how many times people have told me when I tell them that I'm w**king on Star Trek, their response is, 'Is that still on?' Many people don't know we are here." He advised fans w**king to save the series to "make as much noise as possible!"
Echoing Jolene Blalock (T'Pol), who said in a recent interview at Coast to Coast that the on-set mood is gloomy, Coto said that the staff of Enterprise were "understandably let down by the news" of the cancellation and feel validated by the fan efforts to save the series. "We are constantly talking about it and asking how it's going," he revealed. "As for what's happening inside Paramount or UPN, I couldn't say, but I imagine it isn't going unnoticed. We have the full page ad from the L.A. Times in my office...fan campaigns have succeeded in the past and they will again in the future."
Like Rick Berman, who has said he thought it would be financially impossible to put Enterprise on another network (story), Coto said he thought monetary considerations would make a move difficult. "I think the obvious choice [for a new venue] is the Sci-Fi Channel. But the Sci-Fi channel doesn't have a great deal of money and we would need to retool the budget...part of me wishes we could just stay on UPN; with more support from UPN we would be fine."
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Hovis - February 27, 2005 01:15 AM (GMT)
Interesting, James.
I know I'd have quite liked to have found out the idea of 'Future Guy', and getting Shran on board would have been cool. A decent run out for Jeff Combs would have been well deserved, IMO.
All in all, some good ideas there. Shame they will never get used. Keep him on board, all ready to go when the Powers That Be want to launch Trek again, whether it be 3, 5 or 10 years. Just so long as the gruesome twosome are well out of the picture.
Andrew (HM) :upside:
Crichton Kicks - February 27, 2005 01:27 AM (GMT)
I'm quite confident at this point, that B&B never had a clue as to FG's identity :rolleyes:
There are certainly some interesting ideas there, and I'd love to see JC get an extended run on Trek, you're right, it's well deserved !!
Matthew Matic - March 1, 2005 09:39 AM (GMT)
Most of Coto's plans seem to be doing things we've already seen in other Trek, starbases, mirror universes, Stratos, founding of the Federation. Although I would love to see these things I think it would be better for Enterprise, as a TV series, to do things that no other Trek has done before.
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| "I would be happy to be doing Star Trek for the rest of my life." |
I would be happy to brew beer for the rest of my life, that doesn't mean I'd brew lager.
Trek needs a rest, a fresh start and the expulsion of B&B
Hippy - March 1, 2005 01:36 PM (GMT)
| QUOTE (Matthew Mattic @ Mar 1 2005, 10:39 AM) |
Most of Coto's plans seem to be doing things we've already seen in other Trek, starbases, mirror universes, Stratos, founding of the Federation. Although I would love to see these things I think it would be better for Enterprise, as a TV series, to do things that no other Trek has done before.
| QUOTE | | "I would be happy to be doing Star Trek for the rest of my life." |
I would be happy to brew beer for the rest of my life, that doesn't mean I'd brew lager.
Trek needs a rest, a fresh start and the expulsion of B&B
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Not sure I agree with this, part of the main problem I had with Enterprise was that it specifically failed to go in to the founding of the federation and buggered about with temporal cold war storys and races that were new and created pretty much to try and get a new storyline in.
Totally agree that a rest is needed and the expulsion/execution of B & B :)
As a side note DS9 did things no Trek show had done before and many fans tuned off because it dared to be different :(
Crichton Kicks - March 1, 2005 06:37 PM (GMT)
| QUOTE (Hippy @ Mar 1 2005, 01:36 PM) |
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| Not sure I agree with this, part of the main problem I had with Enterprise was that it specifically failed to go in to the founding of the federation and buggered about with temporal cold war storys and races that were new and created pretty much to try and get a new storyline in. |
I'd have to agree with that. Part of why I'd originally been looking forward to Enterprise was the timeframe. The founding of the Federation and the Romulan war were both important events of the period. Enterprise had the chance to be even more epic than DS9. They just played it completely the wrong way. It's almost like Berman and Boy Blunder knew that if they went down the 'epic' route then they'd be admitting that Ira Behr and Ron Moore were on the right track with DS9 :rolleyes:
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| Totally agree that a rest is needed and the expulsion/execution of B & B :) |
Same here. Agree 100% :thumbsup:
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| As a side note DS9 did things no Trek show had done before and many fans tuned off because it dared to be different :( |
Yeah, but those people were clearly f*cked in the head ;) :lol:
Number Six - March 2, 2005 01:13 PM (GMT)
| QUOTE (Hippy @ Mar 1 2005, 03:36 PM) |
Not sure I agree with this, part of the main problem I had with Enterprise was that it specifically failed to go in to the founding of the federation and buggered about with temporal cold war storys and races that were new and created pretty much to try and get a new storyline in.
Totally agree that a rest is needed and the expulsion/execution of B & B :)
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That was the problem Enterprise should have boldy gone where it could only go. The founding of the Federation. Instead it buggered about wioth the Xindi. Now I thought that this was a pretty good story but lets face it, you could have set that story in Picard's time and it would have been much the same.
Hippy - March 3, 2005 12:12 PM (GMT)
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| Yeah, but those people were clearly f*cked in the head |
:lol: :lol: