Bring these back ;-)

The other day I was thinking back to the 1990s and early 2000s when we had two or three star trek series going on at the same time.  Man, that was entertaining ;-).  The recent DC universe (Arrow, Flash, Supergirl, Legends of Tomorrow) shows on the CW have made me ponder about what a Star Trek equivalent would be like (call it the TCTU - Trek Cinema and TV Universe - yeah there are issues there, both with the acronym, and with the rights spread across many different rights holders, but stick with me for a while).

So, what would the format look like?  While I do enjoy 24 episode seasons, I think that those don't work as well in today's television environment and they invite a lot of filler episodes just to get scripts done. I think that something like the 13-episode season that the walking dead has or that BBC shows have would be more appropriate for better story telling (and less filler).  In my proposal each season would be 16 episodes:

• 1 two-hour premier each season (hence 2 episodes)
• 13 regular story-telling episodes
• 1 special episode (think Dr. Who Christmas special) where the events of that special tie into the coming season, foreshadow some things, promote character development, and can play into a larger story arc.

There would be 4 series going on at the same time, perhaps two of them in the September-January timeframe and the other in the March-July timeframe for the regular episodes, and the specials can occur throughout the year (would be a good reminder that the shows exist even when they are off the air).  So what would my proposed series be?

1. Star Trek: Federation
This would be a post-Enterprise show, starting around 2156.  The main focus of the show would be the Romulan war and the founding of Federation. It could be part war-story, part political intrigue, part espionage. Between these two events you could get 4-5 seasons of the show. If you want to continue the show with the comings and going of a fledgling federation you can. After all you would still have 60 (or so) years before the events of Discovery.


2. Star Trek: Phase II
Yes, I know.  Phase II was going to be a series, and it is actually an alternate name for a TOS production (which seems to be on hiatus).  I'd say let's bring the name back.  This would be a post-TOS (post-five year mission) and it would go up to the Wrath of Khan.  This gives the story tellers about 15 years worth of time (2270-2285) to tell stories in the Trek universe, and it gives them a great opportunity to revamp those funky psychedelic Motion Picture uniforms (pictured above).


3. Star Trek: The Final Frontier
OK, the title would be confusing (you figure out another one) since there is a movie by that title, but this series would take place after the Undiscovered Country (Star Trek 6) and before The Next Generation. This basically gives a big sandbox from 2293 to 2364 to tell stories. I think this would be the place to run into TOS alumni (you know, captain Sulu ans such), as well as tell stories from the frontier. This is also a largely unknown timeperiod in the trek universe (from what I know anyway), so exploration of the inner working of the Federation, the Enterprise C, diplomatic stuff happening post Kitomer, and so on.  Might also be a good place for mirror universe stories.


4. Star Trek: Timelines
Yes, I know, another probelamtic name considering that there is a game with that title, but let's go with it for now.  This would be a 29th Century Star Trek following the adventures of a crew of chrononauts. Remember Captain Braxton on Voyager?  Yes, those ships and crew is what I am talking about.  I wouldn't go so far as to describe it like the Dr. Who of Star Trek (Dr. Who is a little more whimsy) but it would be interesting to see contemporary 29th century stuff going on (what does the unvierse look like then, what are the geopolitics, who's who in that time period) while at the same time exploring other eras in the trek franchise.


5. Bonus: Tie-in specials: 31st century temporal cold wars 
So, the idea behind this bonus is a series that is a cross-over amongst the previous 4 series with a 31st century agent (or sets of agents, or a ship and crew) traveling back in time and working with the ship and crew (or specific cast from the other series) to shed light on the temporal cold war. This would be 4 episodes per year, with each episode being 2 hours. So in the grand scheme of things you'd have 6-hour-long episodes worth of temporal cold war spanning the previous 4 series, with additional crew.


Thoughts?