Wither Trek

After watching the best episode of Trek ever, it's really underlined how Star Trek has seen better days. Long gone are the days when fellow retail clerks would tap their name tags and say, "Mr. Data, beam us up!" Now, in my IT office, 2 out of 12 people watch Star Trek. And this is amogst geeks. Geeks!

In a visual sense, this graph really tells the tale:

I'm looking forward to the demise of Star Trek in only that its total death may give the premise time to heal. My front running ideas:

- Tales of Trek: Anthology series set in the Trek universe. Half Twilight Zone, half Trek (of all eras). I liked the Twilight Zone and it ran on the concept not on the star power. I also really liked the Trek episodes cut from that cloth (e.g. Charlie X).
- Star Trek: Remake the original series. Recast the roles. Make the show snug into Trek lore from the get-go. After all, the Federation came into the show somewhere in the late first season. The Enterprise is called "USS Enterprise" not because it's a "United Space Ship" but because the decal makers assumed that the ship is run by space Americans. Remake some of the classic episodes and introduce some new spins.
- Trader Captains and Merchant Princes: Steal from the FASA RPG. Make a story set in TOS era with a merchant crew who gag on the syrupy goodness of the Federation.

The ideas of I dread:
- Starfleet Academy: NCC-90210
- Klingon Assault Group: Geeks like to sing. I don't why, but they do. I feel that a show with 10% bat'leth fights, 10% disrupter fire, 40% sub-titles and 40% Klingon war songs will kill Trek more thoroughly than Michael Jackson's kids album.
- Next Gen Lamo Rehash: For all the lack of juice that DS9 (to boldy stay where no one has stayed before) and Voyager (... looking for that shining beacon called Earth...) had, they did well. A fourth kick at that can will be impossible.