Lower Decks

Contrary to popular belief, Star Trek did not enter the movie business simply because of the success of ‘Star Wars’ in 1977 (with apocryphal accounts suggesting Paramount more or less remarking, “What’ve we got like that?”). Gene Roddenberry, the fans, and even the studio that had seen the original series apparently run its course after three seasons in 1969 were looking for ways to revive it throughout the 1970s, including the relatively obscure but still famous ‘Phase II’ attempt to launch a new TV series, which led directly to what audiences finally saw at the end of 1979.

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The fall of 2004 marked the dawn of a whole new era in genre programming, with the debut of ‘Lost,’ which, at least temporarily, opened the floodgates to networks becoming receptive to wild ideas, bold concepts, and big stories. But wide audiences weren’t flocking to sci-fi, at least not in the traditional sense, at least not outside of cable (where niche fans were gobbling up Stargate and ‘Battlestar Galactica’ with renewed vigor), and certainly not to Star Trek, which was now seen as a relic. And the only victim left was ‘Enterprise,’ which had just completed one of the most ambitious franchise seasons ever. The fourth season would be one last-ditch effort to win fans, if not audiences, over again.

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“The Expanse” had already prepared fans for what they could expect in the fall of 2003, when ‘Enterprise’ would take Star Trek for its most sustained serialized storytelling ever, an entire season of a single arc. ‘Deep Space Nine’ had done direct stretches of six and ten hours, sure, and famously had the most involved writing in franchise history, but this was going to be more ambitious still. Would it be enough to win back the interest of viewers?

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Like every other Star Trek before it, ‘Enterprise’ spent its second year in apparent ignorance that its original approach wasn’t connecting with fans, which at this point was either really a problem with viewers or really a problem with the creators (isn’t it a little hard to understand, putting it into such stark language?), but probably not both (but then again, probably both). Either way, the season began in 2002, which was notable as also seeing the release of ‘Star Trek Nemesis,’ the final ‘Next Generation’ film, to incredible apathy (and some outright vitriol), which helps mark this year as the hammering of the final nail of the coffin in this incarnation of the franchise. History, really, was just repeating itself. The original series probably would have been more of an actual success if it had been able to truly capitalize on that second chance. But it didn’t, and by that point, the third really didn’t matter. Wasn’t that just true of ‘Enterprise,’ too?

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Everyone remembers the fall of 2001. The new millennium wasted little time in making history, and Star Trek had nothing to do with it. Yet that’s also when the fifth live action TV series in franchise history launched, at the time hotly anticipated, at last a moment when all the fans seemed to be buzzing with positive energy again, arguably for the first time since 1993, when ‘Deep Space Nine’ launched. Yet the enthusiasm, as everyone would soon realize, would be short-lived.

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In the fall of 2000, ‘Voyager’ began its seventh and final season in a unique position. Unlike ‘Next Generation,’ which reached the same point with massive popularity but low on creative energy, or ‘Deep Space Nine,’ rearing on the strength of a critically approved sixth season and faced with the daunting task of wrapping up everything it had been working on throughout the series, ‘Voyager’ was relatively free of expectations, and was thus free to bow out however it liked. To say more of the same would be very deceptive indeed.

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In the fall of 1999, ‘Voyager’ began its final two seasons as the only Star Trek anyone would see at that time, a novelty that was lost on fans who had already grown jaded. Its sixth season would in fact turn out to be its least popular, which was not so surprising, given the circumstances. It was also a downright shame.

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The 1998-1999 season was the last time Star Trek would overlap itself on TV, ending a seven year stretch that saw the franchise reach the apex of its cultural appeal at the time, and its steady decline. ‘Star Trek: Insurrection’ would be released in the middle of the season, marking the first of two nails in the coffin of the film series from this incarnation, proving that even the once-mighty ‘Next Generation’ crew was not immune from this loss of interest, even though, two years earlier, it had just reached perhaps its widest mark of approval with ‘Star Trek: First Contact.’ So while ‘Deep Space Nine’ completed its seven year run, ‘Voyager’ was about to find out if it could carry the weight of expectations. Its fifth season would be crucial indeed.

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For some reason, Star Trek was never really good about changing cast members. The original series completely recast itself once, but it was between pilots, so no one ever really knew, before adding Chekov (the shaggy-headed Russian meant to boost popularity) in the second season. ‘Next Generation’ lost Yar in the first season, switched doctors in the second (before quickly switching back in the third). ‘Deep Space Nine’ brought in Worf in its fourth. But it’s safe to say that no Star Trek ever affected a complete reinvention with the addition of a single character like ‘Voyager’ did with Seven of Nine (Jeri Ryan).

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In the fall of 1996, the franchise was celebrating its thirtieth anniversary, which was an event every incarnation got to celebrate. But perhaps more importantly, ‘Next Generation’ got to enjoy its most obvious parting gifts to the two shows that immediately succeeded it, thanks to the success of that winter’s ‘Star Trek: First Contact.’ Midway through its fifth season, ‘Deep Space Nine’ inherited the distinctive new movie’s uniforms. And midway through its third, ‘Voyager’ inherited the Borg.

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