small thoughts...
Please don't have time travel be an ongoing theme!
I agree. Especially not in the old hokey ways I'm imagining. Now it's cowboy times. Now it's a hastily imagined future. Now it's the crew as children. Please no.
Please don't repeat the Voyager premise.
I never did watch Voyager. It never won you over I guess? Did you push through it anyways? Were there a few highlights? Did you like the premise for the purposes of
that show, and you don't want to see it repeated? Or do you find that premise not very good, period.
Please don't make Dr. Leah Brahms a main character. Not a big fan.
I could see that character's passing being the impetus for Geordi reconnecting with Picard perhaps. That would solve that problem.
Like the ideas of "room for some good characterization... slow it down a bit, overarching science mystery" and "The climax is a stirring speech..."
The most important question though is, What would smirnoff's treatment of Stewart's new vehicle look like?
Oh boy. Scary question. I have to take off my just-another-whiny-fan hat and think like a writer. So much responsibility! So little skill to tap into!
A part of me really wants to avoid anything that veers into "old-timers in space, DON"T LET THEIR AGE FOOL YOU THOUGH! THey've still got it!" and all the cliches that go with it. "Oh look, my old uniform doesn't fit" and so on (PLEASE NO!) Especially don't play it for a cheap laugh.
I mean this is the 24th century. I don't think that 70-something then means what 70-something means today. I would just as soon avoid the whole question entirely. Don't have anyone give him the side eye with a look that says "isn't he a bit old for this"... loads of the admirals we see are well up in age, and nobody minds.
But how to begin. And what is the premise for Picard once again trekking among the stars? Where has he been? What has he done? Need we explain it?
Okay so I'm largely drawing a blank after sitting here for an hour thinking about it. But. What if the primary story conflict (meaning the overarching multiseason really big idea) had something to do with the vastness of space suddenly not being quite so vast.
A universal change has taken place. While there has been a period of doubt, and speculation, and there are still holdouts and non-believers, the consensus is in. In a universe that once seemed limitless and ever expanding, a boundary has been discovered. And if a boundary has been discovered it can mean only one thing... it must be collapsing. A rising tide but on an astronomic scale. Civilizations you encounter are not quietly and slowly evolving, they are fleeing, if they even have the means to do so. It will take many years to happen, far more than anyone currently alive will ever live to see, but that it is happening is undeniable. Therein lies the basis for a mission which trumps all other missions. The last mission. The final frontier.
How much do you disrupt you life for a situation which you'll never live to see? A situation so far in the future, but a situation which is inevitable nonetheless. Earth, and the Federation, finds itself asking this very question. Is it a doomed mission? In a sense, yes. And perhaps, without putting to fine a point on it, in later life one
particular Starfleet officer finds himself rather more ready to embrace such a mission.
Cut to Picard reading whatever allegorically appropriate piece of classic literature encapsulates said dilemma. He puts the book down. He sits in quiet reflection in whatever cozy home he lives in. Long beat. He gets up while the camera holds on the empty chair. The implication is that an important decision has just been made. Cut to title sequence.
So begins a series of difficult, Prime Directive-bending, missions wherein a choice must be made: If a civilization does not have the means to buy themselves more time, or perhaps lacks even the knowledge of it's immanent destruction, is the Federation obliged to get involved, or even morally allowed to? The Prime Directive would say no, strictly speaking. However that was written at a time when the nature of the universe was fundamentally different. So uh, yea, to say we're in the weeds in an understatement. Is it Captain's discretion? Morally difficult questions must be answered. Mistakes will be made. What choice is there? However the mission proceeds, it will do so at the edge of space.
This clustermug of a premise presents all sorts of options, with a plausible reason for Picard being involved I think.
MartinTeller... you're a TNG fan, and with a recent run through the series. What are your feelings on this return of Picard?