Originally I had not planned to tackle Enterprise so soon after Voyager however the ideas have been brewing away now for a while – so I figured now is as good a time as any.  

HOW TO MAKE ENTERPRISE WORK

1. Change the name of the Star-ship

Legacy is important. This ship was supposed to be the first Warp 5 vessel and that was made out to be a big deal, with that in mind it would have been better to name it something unique not have it ride on the coat tails of the Enterprise.  Additionally as far as I was aware the first space ship called Enterprise was supposed to be Kirk’s in any case* so why muddy the water unnecessary with this whole experimental ship nonsense.  Personally I would have gone with something like Endeavor or Discovery, a name that sounds like they are forging into new territory and has a bit of a history behind it.** 

2. Design.

I actually quite like the design of the ship, I even like the jumpsuit design of the costumes which some people took issue with. What needed a little work was the overall style of the technology on display. For all it’s faults Revenge of The Sith did a great job of showing the progression from the Prequels to the Original Trilogy and the show runners should have thought along similar lines.  Admittedly this is a minor quibble but it’s attention to detail like that that turns something good into something great.

3. Aliens.

We will get to Vulcans later but first I want to talk about the other races used in the series.  I really don’t get the need to introduce so many new species into a series set in the past. There are so many already established that it makes sense for a lot of the first contact situations to have been with cultures we already knew. Admittedly my Trek knowledge is far from perfect but instead of the Xindi why not use the Romulans as your main antagonist, or even the Andorians? Hell you wouldn’t have needed to change the overall story arc that much to do this.

While we are on the subject I want to talk about Dr Flox. Again why bother with another new race when someone like the Betazoids would have done. It’s been established that Earth has a long alliance with them and aside from the family Troi we know jack about them.  A Betazoid Doctor could have made for a really interesting character, especially if people had issues with his/her ability to read their minds. the stories write themselves.

And don’t even get me started on the Klingons.

4.Vulcans.

I’m not going to spend to much time on this because everyone and their grandmother knows how badly the stuffed the Vulcans up. All I am going to say is was it really that hard to stick to the classic interpretation?  Given what we know of the race it would have been pretty easy to make them appear to be overprotective  without the need to completely rewrite Trek lore.  Again the pilot wouldn’t have needed to be changed that much just use what’s already there.

Ultimately the show should have been about how humanity went from a very minor blip to becoming a galactic power, that’s the story we wanted to see told. The cast (aside from Flox) was fine and I would have loved to have seen some great stories told with them.

But with Braga and Berman in charge that was never going to happen.

*Nerd Alert:  Well, Robert April’s to start with. Then Pike, Then Kirk

** What with them both being Space Shuttles and all.