star trek third world war

The Eugenics War And World War III In The Star Trek Universe, Explained

"Star Trek: Strange New Worlds" reaches deep into "Trek" canon. You don't need to know about the Eugenics Wars and World War III to enjoy the mostly standalone show, but ... has a little extra knowledge never hurt? Especially when the first episode of the new Paramount+ series references these past events so heavily.

When "Star Trek" was first conceived in the mid-1960s, the '90s still seemed like a far way off. It was far away enough that the writers of "Trek" felt completely comfortable extrapolating a future history that would begin as early as 1992. "Star Trek" did not predict Boyz II Men's " The End of the Road " being the biggest album that year, but they did predict the eventual rise of Khan Noonien Singh, a genetically enhanced ruler who would, thanks to his ambition, enhanced intellect, and increased strength, take over the world. 

Although none of the extant "Star Trek" canon has depicted it directly, there are two major world conflicts in the "Star Trek" timeline that were necessary to bring about Gene Roddenberry's peaceful vision of the future: The Eugenics Wars and World War III. Roddenberry, after all, created "Trek" in the mid-1960s, a time when he could look out his window and see a great amount of turbulence that likely didn't leave him feeling hopeful. Racial segregation was on the books, greed was corrupting the world, and the Vietnam War was raging. It was not an optimistic time. Roddenberry seems to have sensed — or at least feared — that a collapse was imminent. That is, if the future built into the history of the "Star Trek" universe is any indicator of Roddenberry's attitudes. 

As such, the world — to Roddenberry's eyes — would need the Etch-A-Sketch treatment before a better future could begin. Shake up the whole planet, erase the picture, and begin drawing again. Humanity, by Roddenberry's assumed estimation, needed to nearly collapse under its own destructive hubris before it realized that looking up to the stars was preferable to killing one another en masse. 

While the timeline has shifted around a lot as the decades have passed (the latest season of " Star Trek: Picard " takes place in 2024, and the Eugenics Wars are not in full swing), they still seem to hang heavily over the near-future of "Star Trek." Indeed, genetic engineering is a large part of the second season of "Picard," one of the main villains being Dr. Adam Soong (Brent Spiner) a geneticist who wants to enhance humanity for the better ... and for the worse. 

The Eugenics Wars

The first time audiences heard of The Eugenics Wars was the during the "Star Trek: The Original Series" episode " Space Seed ," which first aired on February 16, 1967. In it, the Enterprise discovers a seemingly deactivated "sleeper ship," the S.S. Botany Bay, wherein a small group of human beings have been in cryogenic sleep for 200 years. Of the 84 people frozen, 72 are still alive. The Enterprise rescues and resurrects their leader, finding him to be none other than Khan Noonien Singh (Ricardo Montalbán), the onetime dictator of Earth. "Space Seed" offers a good deal of exposition regarding Trek history: In the 1990s, humans were subjected to breeding experiments, resulting in arrogant and powerful superbeings who took over much of the world. 

Although "Star Trek" is ultimately a show centered on pacifism, there is a lot of dialogue in "Space Seed" to describe how awesome Khan is as a warlord. Several characters describe him as a benevolent dictator — reminiscent of Plato's philosopher kings — who didn't engage in genocide and who didn't start a war until he was attacked. The episode's writers, Gene L. Coon and Carey Wilbur, seem torn between writing a show that touts a philosophy of pacifism, and their own Nietzsche-like admiration of a powerfully willed man. 

The actual catalytic event that kicked off the Eugenics wars has never been made explicit in "Star Trek," although from "Space Seed" we know that augmented human beings were taking over the world as despots. Khan wasn't as despotic as others of his generation, but he was still a dictator. Indeed, Khan eventually tries to take over the Enterprise. Kirk convinces him that a greater challenge would be to begin society fresh on an uninhabited planet. Khan accepts the challenge, and he — along with all the other augmented people — are dropped off on a planet called Ceti Alpha V. Anyone who has seen " Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan " knows that a major environmental disaster left Khan stuck on a planet that had become a desert. He was stranded there for 20 years. Hence his titular wrath. 

Borderland, Cold Station 12, and The Augments

Additional ex post facto details about the Eugenics Wars were filled in during the fourth season of " Star Trek: Enterprise ." In a three-part episode ("Borderland," "Cold Station 12," and "The Augments"), audiences were introduced to Dr. Arik Soong (Spiner again), who was on the run for developing a race of generically enhanced people, a few of which were running amok among the Klingon Empire. Recall that "Enterprise" takes place nearly a century before the events of the original "Star Trek," so this was long before Khan was resurrected. 

The Augments in this three-parter talk about how Khan was considered their grandfather. There is also a lot of dialogue devoted to the long-held ban of genetic enhancements in the world of "Star Trek." The ban is mentioned multiple times throughout " Star Trek: The Next Generation ," and it will be considered something of a scandal when one of the main cast members of " Star Trek: Deep Space Nine " was secretly an augment since the start. The idea of shaping human history via genetic manipulation has largely been taboo in Trek, seeing as it draws from similar evil ideas of genetic purity often parroted by white supremacists throughout history. Two different Soongs will be responsible for carrying this idea forward: Arik and Adam from "Enterprise" and "Picard."

The three-part episode ends with a cute twist: Arik, having been apprehended, is convinced that genetics is not the path to making perfect people. But maybe cybernetics is. He says to himself that he could likely create a realistic humanoid android, provided he pass the project down a few generations. Boom. This is how we got Data on "Next Generation."

World War III

The details of World War III are often left vague by canonical dialogue. Here's what Trekkies do know:

That World War III was fought from 2026 to 2053. That the war was kicked off by arguments about genetic manipulation left over from the Eugenics Wars, very much the way much of the damage left by World War I led frighteningly directly into World War II. We know from the original series episode "The Savage Curtain" — an episode that sees the resurrection of one Colonel Phillip Green (Phillip Pine), one of WWIII's nastiest dictators — that World War III will involve nuclear attacks, and the utter waste of the Earth's surface. The nuclear apocalypse was also alluded to in "The Next Generation," as well as an episode of "Star Trek: Discovery," wherein a character describes how bombs were being dropped as late as 2053, leading to the devastation that cause all sides to lose. According to dialogue in the "Star Trek: The Next Generation" pilot, "Encounter at Farpoint," World Ward III's ancillary conflicts would continue to rage until the 2070s. 

Viewers also know from "Encounter at Farpoint" that soldiers were controlled by addictive drugs — we see Q (John De Lancie) wearing the uniform of a World War III soldier — and that deliberate acts of eco-terrorism were par for the course. Humanity was bombing one another to no end and deliberately destroying the planet, all while high on drugs. Additionally, humanity would be overrun by brutal, miniature dictatorships, overseen by medieval-style kangaroo courts wherein people would be judged and executed with very little evidence; Q would also put on the garb of the judge seen in these courts. What a pleasant time.

This was the Etch-A-Sketch moment, Roddenberry seemed to feel, that humanity required. In the 1996 film "Star Trek: First Contact," the crew of the Enterprise-E were sucked back to the year 2063, after the bulk of Earth's carnage had ended, and our species was struggling to survive. It was during this time that Zefram Cochran (James Cromwell) would invent the world's first faster-than-light engine. While testing the engine, it would attract the attention of a passing Vulcan vessel, giving them license to come visit. Making First Contact with the Vulcans was a wake-up call for all humanity, and people began to unify, realizing that we weren't doing so well on our own, but might improve if we see ourselves as neighbors in a broad, cosmic community. 

Humanity may be in a dark tunnel now, but there will always be a light at the end.

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World War III

• View history
• 1.1 The war
• 2.1 Alternate timelines
• 3.1 External links

History and specifics [ ]

The possibility of a third global war following the first and second was feared for decades, particularly during the Cold War , when geopolitical tensions between Earth's nuclear-armed nation-states were at their height. Part of the mission of Aegis agent Gary Seven was to prevent these tensions from erupting into full-scale warfare. ( TOS episode : " Assignment: Earth "; TOS - Assignment: Earth comic : " Too Many Presidents ")

The war [ ]

Historians traced the earliest phases of the war as far back as the early 2020s , starting in the United States as homelessness, environmental degradation, and violent clashes between competing political groups caused a Second Civil War . The conflict spread throughout the world, becoming known as the Eugenics War before finally turning into the global conflict historians called World War III. ( SNW episode : " Strange New Worlds ")

In 2026 [ citation needed ] factions of eco-terrorists [ citation needed ] launched attacks responsible [ citation needed ] for as many as 37 million deaths. In addition, it is possible that a further root cause of World War III lay in the political destabilization of several European nations [ citation needed ] , including France , which was torn between the Neo-Trotskyists and the Gaullists, circa 2024 . ( ENT episode : " In a Mirror, Darkly, Part II "; DS9 episode : " Past Tense, Part I ")

When war broke out, Optimus Prime ordered his troops to leave Earth, their launch being witnessed by Zefram Cochrane and Lily Sloane . Unbeknownst to Prime, Megatron and his forces followed the Autobots. ( TAS - Star Trek vs. Transformers comic : " Issue 2 ")

At the time of the final conflagration in the 2050s , one side was composed of the New United Nations , including the United States and the European Union ; the other side was an alliance known as the Eastern Coalition . The war's origins went back decades, but by the year 2051 , Lee Kuan had emerged as a general in the military hierarchy of the Eastern Coalition, helping to overthrow the emerging democratic movement within the government of that political bloc. This ultimately helped to cement the ECON's hard line opposition-stance to the United States's policies, bringing it into direct military conflict within two more years.

The final catalyst-events for World War III were a series of confrontations between the New United Nations and the ECON over oil fields located in Antarctica and Taklamakan , a few months before the first major nuclear salvos were launched. Rioting breaks out in several major American cities during the days immediately leading up to the war, with fires and looting prior to the nuclear strikes as people attempted to flee the impending target zones with their lives.

At precisely 0230.26 hours Eastern Standard Time, on 1 May 2053 (an event later known as the "May Day Horror of '53"), the Eastern Coalition launched a first strike comprised of intercontinental ballistic missiles , bomber attacks, and portable nuclear weapons, against major North American and European cities, combined with a simultaneous Interface viral assault against the New United Nations computer infrastructure ( The Immortality Blues ). Much to the surprise of the ECON political leadership, the New United Nations immediately retaliated with nuclear launches of their own, as well as bomber and satellite-based attacks against targets in the Middle East and Asia . Many Pacific nations sided with the Eastern Coalition against the United States when fighting finally breaks out. Other political groupings, such as the Muslim Bloc , were likewise hit extremely hard during the nuclear exchanges, despite being non-aligned with either side during the war. [ citation needed ]

The detonation of nuclear weapons over cities (in the multiple-megaton range) such as Washington, D.C. , London , Moscow , Berlin , New York City , Boston , Dallas , Mexico City , Paris , Rio de Janeiro , Tel Aviv , Jerusalem , Mecca , Riyadh , Samarkand , Karachi , Singapore , and New Delhi killed nearly half a billion people instantly. Smaller detonations occurred over Hong Kong , Beijing , and Ho Chi Minh City . Un-detonated or failed nuclear devices were discovered in or around targets such as Denver , Madrid , Rome , and Istanbul . Of the hundreds of ICBMs and bombers launched by the United States and allied forces, only one in five made it into the air, due to EMP weapons and viral attacks against the military computer networks — of these, only a fraction detonated properly. ( SNW episode : " Strange New Worlds "; TLE novel : The Sundered )

Near Richmond, Indiana , several jets dropped bombs. A group of people took shelter in the East Fork Presbyterian Church . As the bombs dropped, the group and the church was save when the church was transported to Terralysium . The group started the New Eden colony and worshiped the Red Angel who was in actuality a time traveler, Dr. Gabrielle Burnham . ( DSC episode : " New Eden ")

Conventional military forces on both sides were quickly moved into offensive position against their respective foes — on 3 May 2053, the First, Eighth, and Sixteenth Fleets under New United Nations command carry front-line troops into the Bay of Bengal , and the ECON launches a massive invasion of the North American continent, sending troops and military aircraft southward through Canada . Targets in New England (including Massachusetts ), Minnesota , the Rocky Mountains , and the Midwest are hit hard by ECON forces, the U.S. military's defenses along the Canadian border failing utterly. The United States Air Force and United States Army both fought back against the invaders, but lose many fighters and ground soldiers to the enemy. [ citation needed ]

Certain military units were abandoned in enemy territory during the war, including a New United Nations brigade under the command of Colonel Green in Kashmiristan in late May. Finally, the Eastern Coalition's governing palace was destroyed by American forces, killing ECON founder Lee Kuan . [ citation needed ]

The post-atomic horror that followed severely destabilized global civilization; terrorist organizations and rogue states often detonated small-scale "suitcase nukes," while toxins and biogenic weapons were released. Drug-addled soldiers were often sacrificed in conventional battles on the ground after much of the planetary computer systems failed; numerous small-scale conflicts created chaos throughout the globe as warlords fought over the scraps of civilization. As a result of the ICBM detonations, an enormous dust cloud enveloped the Earth, resulting in several nuclear winters. [ citation needed ]

Sovereign nations, including the United States, essentially ceased to exist following the war, the country falling into barbarism, carved up into fiefdoms controlled by competing warlords (including Colonel Green's despotic reign over the Pacific Northwest ). Without federal resources to fall back upon, most local governments are unable to feed their own people; chaos and anarchy would reign for generations afterward, well into the late 21st century . The President of the United States , President Mendoza , survived the initial days of the war, but finds herself in command of very little afterwards. ( TNG episodes : " Up the Long Ladder ", " A Matter of Time "; TLE novel : The Sundered ; TOS - Fortunes of War novel : Dreadnought! ; ST short story : " Mestral "; ST short story : " The Immortality Blues "; ST reference : Federation: The First 150 Years )

The Siege of Las Vegas was a significant battle in the war, with American forces battling ECON troops for control of the city. The forces of the US troops would eventually prove victorious, defeating the ECON troops there.

In the initial nuclear exchange of World War III, Washington D.C. was completely destroyed, along with three surrounding U.S. states. Some major cities, such as Montreal , were actually spared from nuclear hits during the first rounds of ICBM exchanges. ( TNG novelization : Star Trek: First Contact , TOS novel : Spectre )

During fighting in Paris during the war, the Eiffel Tower was destroyed. Additional combat took place in San Francisco , resulting in the destruction of the Coit Tower , among many other structures. ( DS9 novel : Trapped in Time , TNG novel : A Time for War, A Time for Peace )

The U.S. state of Arkansas would be devastated by nuclear weapons at the start World War III, owing to the many military installations in the region. Even into the 23rd century , some portions of the state would remain uninhabitable. ( TOS novel : Elusive Salvation )

In 2054 , one year following the outbreak of hostilities, Colonel Green surprised the surviving United States government by turning up in Alaska at the head of a massive army comprised of both New U.N. and ECON soldiers. President Mendoza ordered Green to stand down, but is refused; Green slaughters his way across the continent, culling the "weak" and "impure" and those afflicted with radiation sickness from humanity's gene pool, killing millions, until finally meeting his demise in Montana from an orbital strike launched by Flint the Immortal . ( ENT episodes : " Demons ", " Terra Prime "; ST short story : " The Immortality Blues ")

Humanity eventually turned over a new leaf when a few courageous people began to realize that they could make a difference. Early in the war, weather-control satellites developed by Flint the Immortal begin modifying Earth's ozone layer in an attempt to regenerate it, along with raising the planetary temperature enough to mitigate the effects of the harsh nuclear winter. This proved successful, ultimately reducing the number of potential casualties from the war.

Adrenaline regimens were discovered to be useful in treating radiation sickness after the war; this would later be supplanted by the even more effective Hyronalin therapies in later decades, after the end of the Atomic Age . The philosophy of Neo-Transcendentalism was founded by Liam Dieghan in response to the war's horrors, seeking to redress the pains of World War III by "returning [humanity] to a simpler life." ( ENT episode : " Judgment "; TOS episode : " The Deadly Years "; TNG episode : " Up the Long Ladder "; ST short story : " The Immortality Blues ")

The war culminated circa 2053 , when several of Earth's governments met in San Francisco to declare a cease-fire, effectively ending the war. ( ENT episode : " Demons ")

In the end, most of the world's major governments collapsed, and over 600 million people had died just from the immediate combat. ( TNG movie , novelization & comic adaptation : Star Trek: First Contact )

Aftermath [ ]

Despite the end of actual hostilities, the after-effects of the war referred to as "the post-atomic horror"—lingered for decades to follow. Rule of law broke down in many places, and legal systems were abolished, with the suggestion to "kill all the lawyers" from Henry VI being taken literally in some places. Asia was particularly devastated. ( TNG episode : " Encounter at Farpoint ")

The year 2073 was considered part of this conflicted era and saw a number of Humans abandon the planet whereupon they settled on the world of Okeanos . ( TOS novel : From the Depths )

Much of the United States economy was ruined, with the population reduced to standards of living less than that of the victims of the Great Depression a century earlier. So great were the horrors that human genius Zefram Cochrane had himself implanted with a pain-inhibiting chip in order to cope with the world around him. Nonetheless, his Project Phoenix was able to secure backing, and led to first contact only ten years later. ( TNG novelization : Star Trek: First Contact )

In the 22nd century , movies depicting World War III were common. ( ENT episode : " Home ")

Captain Christopher Pike used imagery of World War III to convince the people of Kiley 279 that they were about to head down the same self-destructive path that humans did in the 21st century . He later justified to Starfleet Command they had little choice but to do so since the people of Kiley had witnessed the battle between Control and the Enterprise and adapted the technology to develop weapons to wipe each other out. ( SNW episode : " Strange New Worlds ")

In later years, a monument honoring the hundreds of millions dead during the war was erected in San Francisco, on the former site of the Coit Tower. The monument continues to stand into the late 24th century . ( TNG novel : A Time for War, A Time for Peace )

In 2370 , Jake Sisko could not recall if Dresden had been fire bombed during World War III or World War II . ( DS9 novel : Fallen Heroes )

Alternate timelines [ ]

When the USS Enterprise crossed over into George Taylor 's reality, Spock suspected that this Earth's pre-industrial state, even in the year 3978 , was the result of the planet never having recovered from World War III. ( TOS - The Primate Directive comic : " Issue 1 ")

Appendices [ ]

External links [ ].

• World War III article at Memory Alpha , the wiki for canon Star Trek .
• 1 Cheronian
• 2 Ferengi Rules of Acquisition
• 3 Eclipse class

Star Trek: World War III, Explained

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• Star Trek depicts World War III as a grim era with a staggering death toll and nuclear devastation.
• Humanity's realignment of purpose after the war led to the end of war, poverty, hunger, and disease.
• Despite the dark past of World War III, it paved the way for humanity to strive towards creating a more perfect society.

Most fans would agree that the future depicted in Star Trek is an ambitious best-case scenario for humanity. Without scarcity, poverty, and hopelessness, the species can turn its attention toward spreading its good fortune and studying the universe. Looking at contemporary reality can make imagining this future impossible. However, though the heroes of Starfleet live in a utopia, the years between now and then are far less enjoyable. Star Trek fans know that World War III is right around the corner.

Star Trek has a lot of historical details that are consistently told but rarely shown. World War III is a great example. It takes place long before the relevant events of the series. Most Star Trek stories involve contained adventures in which the central crew works to solve a problem with unique science fiction implications. When they dig into the past, they often use it as a grim mirror of the present. The occasional World War III story is no exception.

The final villain of the Star Trek: The Next Generation films shone an uncomfortable spotlight on Jean-Luc Picard.

How did Star Trek 's World War III start?

Star Trek tells its World War III story over the course of dozens of episodes, many separated by decades. Flashbacks, time travel , and extra details have provided fans with some pieces of the war without ever capturing the full picture. The opening of the Third World War varies. Some argue that the Eugenics Wars of 1992 evolved from the Second Civil War , which opened the door for World War III. Bearing in mind that the canon remains in flux, the current timeline suggests that the Eugenics War, the Second Civil War, and World War III may have been one unbroken chain of escalating conflicts culminating in worldwide nuclear devastation . Their link remains questionable, likely owing to the fact that writers have used the terms interchangeably in several instances. In any case, World War III does have some listed events.

According to Q , in the series premiere of The Next Generation , humanity mastered the subtle art of commanding their massive armies with mind-altering narcotics. The United States of America and the Eastern Coalition wielded military forces with the kind of battle drugs that turned soldiers into slaves . The only known major attack was the Eastern Coalition's strike on the US. The single figure most directly blamed for World War III is Colonel Phillip Green. Colonel Green arranged a squadron of eco-terrorists who led a campaign of bloody violence across the Earth.

How did World War III end?

The list of events in Star Trek 's World War III is long and messy. Its conclusion is clear, but the steps to get there remain shrouded in mystery. All the forces involved in World War III agreed to a ceasefire around the year 2053 . The conflict led to the deaths of more than 30% of humanity. The show lists more than 600,000,000 casualties , but the numbers could be considerably higher. Colonel Green's forces took responsibility for at least 37,000,000 deaths. Their campaign involved eradicating anyone suffering from radiation poisoning and working to eliminate anyone who could pass "impurities" on to the next generation. The war also cost at least 600,000 species of animals and plants, all of which went extinct. Discovery features a depiction of the nuclear bombing of Richmond, Indiana. Strange New Worlds mentions similar nuclear detonations in New York City, Washington, Paris, and several other cities. The carnage is inarguable, but the after-effects were fascinating.

How did World War III change humanity?

Somehow, humankind continued their work in deep space travel. Humans launched manned missions to Mars and beyond the solar system during the war. While World War III left many pockets of Earth in "post-atomic horror," scientific advancement continued. Zefram Cochrane built Earth's first warp-enabled ship shortly after the war. A decade after the nuclear devastation concluded, the Vulcans made their first contact with humanity. This brush with a real extraterrestrial pushed humanity to almost instantly set aside their differences. Millions died less than a generation earlier, but every living being on Earth got their act together and redoubled their efforts toward creating a more perfect society. This miraculous realignment of purpose ended war, poverty, hunger, and disease forever. Finally, humankind truly found the war to end all wars . However, in all fairness, the war didn't push humanity to achieve their post-scarcity dreams. They provided the darkness that comes before dawn, allowing humanity to see brighter days ahead.

In the shadow of this incalculable devastation, we find ourselves facing a colossal challenge. There's an entire world to rebuild. Not only our cities and homes, but mankind itself! - Colonel Phillip Green, 2056

There's a stellar military science-fiction story hidden in the annals of Star Trek history. Imagine America and Asia leading massive armies of near-future soldiers turned into callous killing machines through the magic of hard drugs. Imagine a nuclear nightmare consuming almost a third of human life and massive portions of flora and fauna. Imagine the handshake agreement that finally ends the hostilities, finding peace against all odds. Ten years pass as countless survivors struggle against the irradiated hellscape they've created. Then the aliens arrive, and everyone, all at once, drops what they're doing to seek perfection. It's a magical story worthy of a season of TV, but Star Trek tells its World War III tale through a million hidden details.

This batch of space capitalists brings the subtext into the text for Star Trek: Discovery's most on-the-nose villain to date.

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Star Trek and the Shadow of World War III

Star Trek's fictional WWIII casts a long shadow over its timeline, and now Discovery and Picard are exploring how hard-won the show's utopia was.

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It is set in a distant, utopian future, but ever since the original series Star Trek has sought to hold a mirror to contemporary political and moral dilemmas.

In documentary series The Center Seat: Celebrating 55 Years of Star Trek , now available in the UK on IMDb TV, director Brian Volk-Weiss looks at how the show commented on issues such as the Cold War, Vietnam, Civil Rights, and the issue of euthanasia, among others. But as Volk-Weiss points out, there is one issue that has loomed over the Star Trek universe since its inception.

“We talk about this in Center Seat a little bit, all Trekkies know the foundation of Star Trek, in canon, the Federation and Starfleet, everybody’s known since the original series the foundation of those organisations is World War III,” Volk-Weiss says.

Your Last So-Called ‘World War’

It’s true that World War III has cast a shadow over Star Trek from the start. In ‘Space Seed’, the episode that introduced Khan Noonien Singh, Spock describes the Eugenics Wars as “the era of your last so-called ‘World War’”. Later, the episode ‘ Bread and Circuses ’ sees Spock mention that 37 million people died in Earth’s World War III.

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Even when not referenced directly, we see it reflected in episodes like ‘The Omega Glory’, set in a nuclear wasteland that is mysteriously similar to a post-nuclear Earth, right down to the text of the US Constitution.

Star Trek is, whichever way you cut it, the story of a post-apocalyptic Earth. It made sense as a piece of backstory when the show began. Nuclear war was a constant, real and immediate threat, the Cuban Missile Crisis a recent memory. In the sixties a World War III must have seemed like an inevitability – if you give something a sequel people are automatically going to expect a trilogy. That it might not strike until the 1990s or the 21 st century must have seemed as optimistic as anything else in the series.

Even when the Star Trek: The Next Generation pilot aired, only two years before the Berlin Wall came down, nuclear Armageddon was considered such an inevitable part of our future history that it made up a significant portion of the plot of ‘Encounter at Farpoint’. We see Q dressed up as a World War III soldier, and the crew of the Enterprise put on trial in a post-apocalyptic, lawyer-free trial in the age of “nuclear horror”.

From Future History to Canon Lore

Then the Berlin Wall came down. The international stage shifted. A lot of sci-fi future histories started to seem pretty silly in an age where Gorbachev was doing adverts for Pizza Hut .

“People kind of glossed over and don’t think about it too much,” Volk-Weiss tells us. “Even in First Contact , in a weird way it’s glossed over a little bit.”

Star Trek: First Contact is set in 2063, in the aftermath of World War III, and while everyone’s dress is fairly scrappy looking, the lush pine forests that surround Zefram Cochrane’s laboratory are hardly the result of a nuclear winter.

Star Trek: Enterprise references the war a few times, particularly in its closing episodes, but it already feels like Canon Lore rather than a future event that we’re supposed to believe will happen.

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While various source across Star Trek canon agree that World War III starts sometime in the mid-2020s (I know, we’ll get to that) and carries on until the 2050s, we see plenty of stories and references that talk about space colonies, interplanetary and even interstellar missions taking place during that time. Most of this is the simple result of TV writers not paying as much attention to continuity as Memory Alpha editors, but it also reflects the fact that World War III simply wasn’t at the forefront of everyone’s minds the way it has been.

In Star Trek: Deep Space Nine , when O’Brien sees a mid-21 st century altered by time travel, he remarks “And that wasn’t the mid-21 st century I read about in school. It’s been changed. I mean, Earth history has been through its rough patches, but never that rough.” Which must have been pretty grim given it was a period of nuclear war.

A Deadline Approaches

That story was ‘Past Tense’, an episode set in a dystopian 2024 where the homeless were rounded up into camps and forgotten about. If that seems prescient, it’s only because it seemed equally relevant at the time.

“We weren’t being predictive. We were just looking out our windows in the 90s,” Deep Space Nine producer Robert Hewitt Wolfe has said .

2024 gets one other mention in the Star Trek canon, in the Star Trek: The Next Generation episode, ‘ The High Ground ’, when Data refers to “the Irish reunification of 2024”.

Like World War III, this is a prediction that seemed dated following the Good Friday Agreement, but the chaos around Brexit has suddenly made it a lot more plausible. Brexit is only one of a number of frightening and dramatic events that have occurred over the last decade, and once again, Star Trek is responding to them.

“Every ten years there’s a new Bond, a new Batman, to a certain degree now a new Star Trek, and sometimes they resonate with their time and sometimes they don’t and sometimes it’s in the middle,” Volk-Weiss says. “I feel like DS9 is a great example of that. I feel like the greatest example of that of all time is Battlestar Galactica . That whole thing was about 9/11 and the War on Terror. Sometimes it works, as with Battlestar Galactica , sometimes it doesn’t work, as with Enterprise . The problem with what Enterprise did is there were already so many bad things going on you didn’t need to create a brand-new character to cut Florida in half. There was already enough to talk about, while in Galactica it organically fit into the storyline. I think what Discovery and Picard are doing is more on the organic side.”

Star Trek has shown us a potential utopia, and with Deep Space Nine and the use of the black ops Section 31 of Starfleet in Enterprise , Star Trek: Into Darkness and Discovery , it has shown us the potential dark side of that utopia. But new Star Trek seems to be doing something new that even Enterprise didn’t – showing us how we get there.

“I think Discovery and Picard , in their own ways, are slowly but surely showing us, no it was a rough start, it took a lot to get to replicators,” says Volk-Weiss. “It took a lot to get to the Prime Directive. We didn’t get here by accident, and we didn’t get here easily. I think, as the onion peels more and more both shows are showing the underbelly of what would be the future of Star Trek.”

Star Trek: Discovery was the first to remind us of the effects of World War III in the second series episode, ‘ New Eden ’. Here Star Trek returned to another of its favourite tropes – humans transposed from Earth history and set up as an independent colony on another world. This time, the transposed humans were the congregation of a church rescued from a nuclear blast.

Later, Discovery would encounter its own apocalypse in the form of the “the burn”, which destroyed galactic civilisation as we know it and forced the Federation to rebuild from scratch, and rediscover its values along the way.

And Star Trek: Picard ? We know that the history of the Federation has changed, and the early impression suggests this will be a darker and more fascistic future for humanity. And to fix it? Picard and friends go back in time to 2024 . From what we know of Trek canon, World War III is supposed to begin in 2026.

Star Trek obviously doesn’t predict the future. The show has never been about telling us what will happen, only finding new ways of talking about what is happening now . There are no easy answers in science-fiction to the fears a lot of us currently have, whether about hypothetical conflicts or the very real violence happening in Ukraine during the Russian invasion. Once again though, people are scared and seriously talking about the threat of another world war. Perhaps what Star Trek can and has always offered fans is the hope that the same humans who commit world-ending atrocities might one day be capable of building a utopia.

Star Trek: The Center Seat is available to stream now in the UK on IMDb TV.

Chris Farnell

Chris Farnell is a freelance writer and the author of a novel, an anthology, a Doctor Who themed joke book and some supplementary RPG material. He…

Star Trek Takes Place After an Apocalypse on Earth - Here's What Happened

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From its first episodes, Star Trek has been a franchise about humanity, and its potential to evolve into a better version of itself. Gene Roddenberry's passion project set out to explore new worlds, and the ethical and moral outcomes of often painful decisions. But buried in Trek 's lore is the secret key as to why its utopian standards are so important to its civilization. World War III had scorched the Earth, and the scars of the post-atomic horror were still fresh when the United Federation of Planets was founded.

The roots of that final World War are slightly confusing. The original 1966 Star Trek series introduced the Eugenics War in "Space Seed," a conflict that burned through the 1990s as an army of genetically engineered humans tried to overtake Earth. The tyrannical Khan Noonian Singh was arguably the most peaceful of these superhuman warlords, but millions of lives were still lost. Though Spock calls this the Third World War, 1969's "The Savage Curtain" introduces a figure that later becomes the architect of a "true" world war in the mid 21st century, Colonel Green.

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Colonel Phillip Green is described in "The Savage Curtain" as the leader of a genocidal war. Star Trek: Enterprise followed up on Green's history, with an infographic seen in "In a Mirror, Darkly," naming him responsible for thirty-seven million deaths. The fourth season Enterprise episode "Demons" would then offer a stark new clarity to Green's actions. Obsessed with human genetic purity after years of radiation exposure due to a world war he engineered, Green continued to call for genocide to purge undesirable genetics from the human race. Green is the architect of a horror that continued for decades after the atomic war.

Despite Green's demand for further slaughter, humanity slowly began to recover. Less than a decade after his gruesome speech, scientist and inventor Zefram Cochrane would make first contact with the Vulcans in 2063. It was a watershed moment for humanity, the first step towards that better future and its network of allied worlds. But it didn't change the world overnight. Pockets of irradiated land and genetic mutants would persist into the 22nd century and, with them, chaos and distrust would continue to mar Earth.

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Star Trek: The Next Generation premiered in 1987 with the feature-length two-part story "Encounter at Farpoint." Fan-favorite character Q ( John de Lancie ) makes his introduction virtually alongside the new crew, and the omnipotent alien is here to put humanity on trial. He uses a post-World War III tribunal hall to do it, providing the franchise's first glimpse of the fallout and the chaos that laid the foundation for today's Federation. Among Q's throng are drug-addled soldiers, mutants and poverty-stricken rabble, who care more about entertainment than actual justice. As Picard notes, the hall appears as it would have been, and Troi, the Betazed empath, remarks on its lack of illusion.

Set a century prior to Captain Kirk's era, Enterprise  would reveal that the war and its ghastly aftermath had already become fuel for award-bait films. Yet the trials of the post-atomic horror had one last challenge to offer mankind, rooted in all-too-familiar xenophobia. The 22nd century saw the Terra Prime terrorist movement attempt to echo similar real-world attempts to gin up the hate, expulsion and murder of those deemed "other." Terra Prime and its founder, John Paxton, not only believed in the genocidal purity ethics of Colonel Green but held the Vulcans directly responsible for not intervening earlier, preventing the war and its horrific aftermath.

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Terra Prime's extremist views came to include seeing all non-human life as a threat, and they engaged in a series of attempts to destroy the Federation. The crew of the NX-01 Enterprise managed to corner Paxton and arrest him. Paxton's attempt to build a separatist Earth by humans and for humans ultimately failed. By Picard's era, the horrors of WWIII and its aftermath had at last become fodder for the history books, an era to learn from and to never repeat.

With series creator Gene Roddenberry a veteran of the last world war, the warnings of the outcome of another great and terrible war is more than window dressing. Like fellow creator Rod Serling, buried inside Roddenberry's most famous work is the never-ending plea to humanity to be better. And with more than words, Star Trek has shown its audience horrific but useful glimpses of what the consequences should be if humanity ever fails its greatest test.

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‘Strange New Worlds’ Showrunner Explains Show’s “Correction” To Star Trek History

| July 1, 2023 | By: Anthony Pascale 356 comments so far

The latest episode of Star Trek: Strange New Worlds has fans buzzing over how the time-travel adventure addressed some of the established lore of the franchise. Now the co-showrunner is weighing in, explaining how they didn’t really change things as much as set them right.

Star Trek history vs real history

This week’s episode of Strange New Worlds featured Lt. La’an Noonien-Singh going back in time, accompanied by an alternate version of Captain James T. Kirk. La’an’s past is inextricably associated with her infamous ancestor Khan Noonien Singh, often considered Star Trek’s most iconic villain. The 1967 TOS episode “Space Seed” established that Khan and a number of his fellow genetically augmented followers were exiled into space following the “Eugenics Wars,” which Spock noted began in 1992. The 1990s might have seemed like the far future back in the 1960s, but to us, they are already real history, with no sign of a group of genetic supermen trying to take over the world.

Ricardo Montalban as Khan and William Shatner as Kirk in “Space Seed”

This conflict between Trek history and reality was addressed head-on in “Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow,” when La’an literally came face-to-face with her infamous ancestor as a child—not in the late 20th century, but in the mid-21st century… and in Canada. Sera, a time-traveling Romulan agent who was trying to eliminate Earth as a potential future rival to the Empire, planned to have La’an assist in killing young Khan, thus preventing the Eugenics Wars from happening (again, in the 21st century) and therefore cutting off the chain of events (including World War III) which would then lead to first contact with the Vulcans and the beginning of an age of enlightenment that resulted in the establishment of The (Romulan-hated) United Federation of Planets.

During her villain monologuing, Sera explained the timeline discrepancies.

But, yeah, so many people have tried to influence these events, you know, to delay them or stop them. I mean, whole temporal wars have been fought over them. And it’s almost as if time itself is pushing back, and events reinsert themselves. And all this was supposed to happen back in 1992, and I’ve been trapped here for 30 years trying to get my shot at him.

So while officially resetting the Eugenics Wars into the 21st century, Sera offers an in-canon explanation for why they didn’t happen in the 1990s, referencing the Temporal Cold War from Star Trek: Enterprise and asserting that the timeline has changed, but pivotal events like the Eugenics Wars will still “reinsert themselves.”

Adelaide Kane as Sera (Paramount+)

Making the “correction”

While some may believe the show is trying to change Star Trek history or even establish a whole new alternate timeline (à la the Kelvin movies), it appears the motivation was much simpler. Speaking to Cinemablend , co-showrunner Akiva Goldsman offered some context for this timeline change:

This is a correction. Because otherwise, it’s silly, or Star Trek ceases to be in our universe…By the way, this happened in Season 1, so this is not a Season 2 [issue]. It’s a pilot issue. We want Star Trek to be an aspirational future. We want to be able to dream our way into the Federation as a Starfleet. I think that is the fun of it, in part. And so, in order to keep Star Trek in our timeline, we continue to push dates forward. At a certain point, we won’t be able to. But obviously, if you start saying that the Eugenics Wars were in the 90s, you’re kind of fucked for aspirational in terms of the real world.

As noted by Goldsman, the show had already moved the Eugenics Wars into the 21st century. In the pilot episode (written by Goldsman), as Pike showed off footage of Earth’s troubled history, he said:

This is Earth in our 21st century. Before everything went wrong… Our conflict also started with a fight for freedoms. We called it the Second Civil war, then the Eugenics War, and finally just World War III. This was our last day. The day the Earth we knew ceased to exist.

Anson Mount as Captain Pike in the Strange New Worlds series pilot

Pike’s speech to the Kiley in that episode clearly tied the Eugenics Wars to World War III, which had already been well-established within Star Trek canon as happening in the 21st century, eventually leading to that visit from the Vulcans as depicted in the 1996 film Star Trek: First Contact . The latest episode of Strange New Worlds only illustrated the natural conclusion that if the Eugenics Wars took place in the 21st century, then Khan Noonien Singh had to be from the 21st century as well.

Christina Chong as La’an with Desmond Sivan as young Khan

Young Khan growing up at the “Noonien-Singh Institute for Cultural Advancement” indicated there likely was an older Noonien Singh running the program of genetically modifying children. Perhaps this person was also named Khan and his original 1990s history included the Eugenic Wars before that past was changed by some other temporal agent. This kind of speculation is what headcanon is for.

From “Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow”

Star Trek reruns to the ’90s

Strange New Worlds is not the first new Star Trek show to dabble in resetting Khan’s history. In season 2 of Star Trek: Picard , Jean-Luc Picard and his crew traveled back to the early 21st century (specifically 2024). Their mission was to fix the timeline, which included stopping an alternate future Borg Queen from changing history with the assistance of 21st-century geneticist Adam Soong. In the season finale, after that plan failed and all of Soong’s digitally stored research was erased, he pulled out a file folder and paper report called “Project Khan,” dated June 7, 1996. It wasn’t made clear if the project was active at the time or if Soong was considering reactivating it, but the implication was that he would turn his attention to it next and this would lead to the rise of Khan Noonien Singh and the Eugenics Wars in the 21st century.

Project Khan from Picard episode 210

And it’s not just the new shows. In 1996 Star Trek: Voyager traveled back to contemporary Los Angeles for the two-part episode “Future’s End,” with no mention or evidence of any Eugenics Wars (or aftermath) to be seen.

From Voyager “Future’s End”

Correcting for Roddenberry’s vision of the future

As Goldsman explains the show’s “correction” is due to them trying to “keep Star Trek in our timeline.” Keeping the Eugenics Wars (and subsequent age of enlightenment) in our future certainly helps keep the show relevant and consistent with real world history, especially for new viewers. But there is more to it. The motivation for this goes back to Star Trek creator Gene Roddenberry, who envisioned the show (and the franchise) as depicting a hopeful view of humanity’s future. This approach has continued throughout the franchise, with the producers of Strange New Worlds doing what they can to carry on this vision. Roddenberry saw tying Star Trek’s future to our present as an important distinction when compared to other science fiction. In a 20th anniversary interview in 1986, Roddenberry explained:

Perhaps one of the primary features of Star Trek that made it different from other shows was, it believed that humans are improving—they will vastly improve in the 23rd century.

Roddenberry was dedicated to a hopeful vision of the future as depicted in Star Trek . In her book Inside Star Trek , Roddenberry’s longtime assistant Susan Sackett quotes him telling her in 1990:

Almost all of this comes out of my feeling that the human future is bright. We’re just beginning. We have wonders ahead of us. I don’t see how it can be any other way, with the way the future is going. We now have got a telescope up there. We’re photographing the universe. We’re inventing the next life form, which is the computer. We’re in the midst of it. And it will happen.

During the 1970s, Roddenberry often spoke publicly about the show and the philosophy behind it. He was explicit about this link to the future and how humanity will eventually put aside division and embrace diversity. Here is Roddenberry talking again about what differentiates Star Trek from other attempts at sci-fi, as recorded in the 1976 album Inside Star Trek :

So you see that the formula, the magic ingredient, that many people keep seeking and many of them keep missing is really not in Star Trek , it is in the audience. There is an intelligent life form out on the other side of that television too. The whole show was an attempt to say that humanity will reach maturity and wisdom on the day that it begins not just to tolerate, but to take a special delight in differences in ideas and differences in life forms. We tried to say that the worst possible thing that can happen to all of us is for the future to somehow press us into a common mold where we begin to act and talk and look and think alike. If we cannot learn to actually enjoy those small differences, take a positive delight in those small differences between our own kind here on this planet, then we do not deserve to go out into space and meet the diversity that’s almost certainly out there.

Hear Roddenberry’s own words below…

For more about this, check out the latest episode of TrekMovie’s All Access Star Trek podcast discussing “Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow.”

Keep up with news about the  Star Trek Universe at TrekMovie.com .

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I believe if a time cop can manipulate events, then they can go back and set them right. So, just because in this moment La’an ran into young Khan in 2022/3, doesn’t mean a time agent wasn’t able to go back and adjust the eugenics wars back to the 90’s.

Maybe when La’an went back in time with Kirk, she needed to fix one thing so the injured time cop could be brought back to life to go back and fix the timeline.

Yeah that’s the basic hole in the argument. They want to use time travel as an excuse to alter history, but then conveniently ignores that Star Trek goes out of it’s way to reset that altered history to its original state again and again. That’s literally why they created Time cops in the first place, because someone finally realized maybe Kirk, Picard, Sisko or Janeway shouldn’t be responsible for resetting time themselves over and over again (and let’s be honest, they are actually responsible for a lot of it themselves even if they don’t mean to lol).

So they came up with a practical solution Starfleet would make an organization whose job is to observe the timeline and counteract any major change done to it. So it’s odd they ignore how much time was altered here. And maybe they can’t stop everything, but it’s odd it isn’t even acknowledged. It just feels like a huge plothole.

I think that partially explains the dangers of the Temporal War. I think that the agents have to pick and choose their battles and may have actually even chosen to potentially leave alone events that enhanced the Federation in some way.

That may also explain why Admiral Vance was so focused on not sending Discovery back because he was afraid to reopen this risk.

I can get behind this. I have said in the review thread for the episode maybe they just decided it didn’t stop the Federation from forming so they allowed it. But I just have a hard time believing something so big that effected literally billions of lives wouldn’t be considered important enough not to fix. But then again, in the whacky world of Star Trek, they probably had to stop something 10 times worse we never even heard of lol.

I know when the original idea of TCW came about on Enterprise, a lot of people hated the idea. I wasn’t really fond of it myself and I love time travel stories. But the concept makes complete sense as well when time travel is soooo easy to do as Star Trek has ALWAYS presented it as such and you have all these advance species trying to gain a foothold in the galaxy and the Federation is just so big and powerful. This was basically inevitable. Even more so centuries into the future where the technology has advanced much greater than in the 23rd and 24th century.

I hate to say this, but the 23rd Century truly feels far more advanced now than it ever was in TOS or its films. That may be because of the temporal incursions.

Maybe the Federation had its own Annorax for a while.

Bro they have a spore drive, they didn’t have that even in the 24th century. It’s been too advanced for years. Now they can say because it was in a different timeline. Problem solved. 😎

Nothing to do with time travel, more to do with the fact it’s 2023 and not 1969 and production values have moved on.

Perhaps only major changes can be detected by the time cops and their options for a “correction” without setting off other unintended events are limited. Perhaps in those cases they do only enough to let time reinsert the event at a later point.

That’s a valid point but then SAY THAT!! It’s odd everyone in the story know history was greatly altered but no one batted an eye over it. You would think La’an would be a bit curious about it, because her entire lineage was changed (she herself could’ve been erased) unless people want to believe all of Khan’s descendants just happen to come around like in the original timeline. There should’ve been some discussion when the DTI agent showed up in her quarters and La’an confronts her about it. That would’ve been the perfect time.

If you watch the episode Relativity, Ducane is trying to cover every little base to correct the timeline as much as possible for an event that frankly doesn’t really change anything except for Voyager itself. That’s how important it was to keep everything on the straight and narrow. But yeah I get you can’t keep everything as before if an event just has too many variables and so you clean it up to at least keep most important parts of history still flowing, but that should’ve been part of the discussion.

That’s why your idea for a TCW show that you mentioned elsewhere is a great idea! It could explain so much. :)

LOL you read that! Yes, that’s right. It would be great to have that kind of show. Although a lot of people theorized the now dead Section 31 show would maybe dealt with time altercations and even the multiverse. No idea if that was true but if so then I think TCW would’ve had some influence. And maybe the movie will have this premise.

And now thinking about what I said above, actually it’s wrong. Reading Goldsman comments and remembering what happened in the premiere episode, for La’an, Khan being born in the 21st century and not the 20th century is what always happened from her POV. She literally states it in the episode when she told Khan he was exactly where he was suppose to be because that’s how history has always unfolded for her. Again, they went on and on in this episode trying to figure what had changed in that year to alter history but Khan’s own presence was never an issue.

That would’ve been a better twist for the audience after Sera monologues about how time works and mentioned that Khan was suppose to take over the world in the 90s then La’an should’ve been like “Whaaaaaaat????’ And then had the conversation with the DTI agent that history was altered in some way long ago and they could’ve still acknowledged it that way.

Annnd that would also explain why a Noonien Singh is now aboard the Enterprise because in this timeline, that family tree held up much stronger centuries later because there damn sure wasn’t one aboard in the TOS timeline. I don’t give a damn what anyone tries to spin. It’s ridiculous on its face. But now knowing what we know, it’s not so ridiculous (but still ridiculous ;)).

But this proves the case that SNW is an altered timeline now. You can’t get around that if from their POV Khan was always just a 21st century Hitler and not another 20th century version Kirk and company learned about in school.

Didn’t think about that but it makes sense. 👍

I mean if someone can give me a different argument, I’m all ears. But what else could it be for La’an if Khan has always existed in this period for her but clearly not for Sera?

Doesn’t that just suggest she along with everyone else on the ship has been living in an altered timeline? If they ask this Spock what year Khan ruled Earth, I don’t think he’ll say 1992 like Spock in TOS did. But my head is starting to hurt lol.

As both Chief O’Briens would say, I hate temporal mechanics.

Yeah seem obvious to me too and it’s now an altered timeline.

Or, just call it a “reboot” and be done with it.

DTI is much more interesting than Section 31.

You get to have dozens of out of time characters; an Andorian from 210 AD, a Surak era Vulcan, a liberated Borg from the 29th Century, a Human woman from 1980s San Francisco, all living together on a Space Station out of time inside of a Black Hole with a dramatic view of the end and beginning of the Universe.

Oh definitely agree on that. I wasn’t endorsing the idea of a Section 31 show and was really not into the idea for a host of reasons. But I would’ve supported it if it happened, especially if was going to be based on time travel.

But I love your idea of a DTI show. Fans keep saying they want to do something new and interesting with the franchise, this is the perfect example. Think a bit more out of the box. Trek has so many amazing concepts out there and they can do all kinds of interesting things with a time travel component.

The key problem here is Akiva and co. Thinking they need to marry up events with our current history. Trek is fiction, and has its own history. There is no reason to assume that the 1990’s of Trek’s past couldn’t have happened. The changes they’re making are far more egregious than two episodes of Voyager where they go back to the 1990’s with no mention of the Eugenics wars. Yet.. here we are, saying this fits within canon and this is the prime timeline. I guess we’ll just shift again when Trek shows are produced at the time Toronto is supposedly wiped out. smh. So lazy. What a joke.

I understand your gripes, but I also really appreciate what Goldsman said. Keeping the Trek Universe in our future is part of the core philosophy of the entire franchise in the first place. It’s aspirational. I didn’t like the episode at all (aside from performances) but I love the idea of keeping the aspirational aspect intact.

I think everyone can agree it’s good to make the show feel connected and aspirational to our world, but I don’t know how moving a story about supermen taking over the planet does that?? It’s just a very odd thing to connect it to.

And then what’s really head scratching about it is he says he wanted to move the event forward to keep up with our reality BUT this is also the same guy who created a manned mission to Jupiter in Picard season 2 that isn’t anywhere close to our reality but suppose to believe is happening a year from now.

So let me get this straight, he wanted to move the Eugenics War because it dates the show too much due to it’s time placement. But then he creates another event that dates the show literally the year it was introduced in? So what are we missing???? Unless people are convinced NASA is going to start flying people to Jupiter by next year or something it already feels out of place to our world.

And I get the Eugenics War is a well known event and has a wider impact on canon. But this is why people get frustrated because no one is forcing anyone to do these things but then they still break their own rules and story consistency. So in another 5-10 years, should we expect someone to retcon that flight or just tell us Picard somehow got the date wrong too because he’s super old and time travel wrecks havoc on the brain.

And that’s why I don’t buy anything this doorknob says about his show working within Trek canon. I honesty don’t know if he is just so high on his own fluctuance that he really believes this stuff or if he is fully aware his show screwed up so very badly that he had to make this stuff up in a weak attempt to cover up is own incompetence.

I like you! 😊

No, there is no reason they can’t keep the aspirational theme and keep all of the fictitious Trek history where it was. None. In fact, one could argue that since in reality there was no Khan is aspirational in and of itself. Things need not match our reality to be aspirational. The character Superman is aspirational. But he’s not real, either.

So, no. What he says I really can’t believe he truly buys. I think he’s desperately trying to make his pathetic mistakes work within the realm of the Trek sandbox.

I’m cool with the change but yeah this explanation is just silly. I been watching Trek since 1998. and don’t think I ever watched Space Seed until a few years later. I remember watching it and thought Khan had a cool backstory and not remotely caring that the war happened when I was still in high school because it’s a fake story on a TV show for bleep sake.

I didn’t fall in love with Star Trek because of it’s fake history. I fell in love with it because of its great characters, cool aliens and smart stories (that excludes Threshold of course…still my worst episode in Trek). I never cared it was close to the real world or not.

You have to be an old hardcore nerd to let something like this bother you for 30 years. 😅

Star Trek is just a TV show. None of this is real.

I think its more laughable that they still used paper on TOS lol.

Currently , there never was Eugenics war in the 1990s, so obviously that correction never happened.

Yep. If there is a future “temporal agency” designed to keep things right and make sure time incursions don’t deviate history too much they would have certainly gone back and fixed it so Khan rises to power in the ’90’s.

This is all BS to explain away why their foolish takes on Trek are better.

I certainly get Goldsman points and that the ultimate message of showing how the world will evolve for the better in our universe. But same time, people have to also just accept it’s all fiction too and that you’re working on a property that made just as many crazy predictions about Earth’s past as its future and you’e not going to resolve it all by just throwing the show in an alternate timeline over and over again.

For the record, I don’t have an issue of what they did and really like it actually. But not because it keeps Star Trek fake history ‘relevant’ but because it made clear the show was in an alternate timeline thanks to the TCW and because of that it doesn’t have to follow canon so stringently. When you move the Eugenics War by 30 years that is also still 300 years in the past then that ripple effect can change practically anything even if a lot of it ultimately gets course corrected. But now they can have an open war with the Gorn years before Kirk encounter them in Arena. Hell, I suspect the way things are going on this show, Kirk and Pike will be fighting the Gorn together next season lol. If Spock decides he wants to dump T’Pring and be with Chapel, that can happen too. Of course I don’t know how his feelings change for his fiance because Future Guy changed history enough for Khan to be born later but I still don’t understand how Nero destroying the Kelvin made Sulu suddenly gay either. It’s time travel and alternate universe shenanigans, that’s the beauty of it, no one can figure it out, so don’t even try lol.

I know for anyone who knows my handle that I sound like a broken record at this point but if you want to keep Trek’s history relevant to contemporary times, fine, just reboot it and you can say the Eugenics wars started in 2100. Zefram’s Cochrane’s warp flight didn’t take place until 2150 and the Federation is born in the 23rd century instead of the 22nd. Maybe Kirk’s Enterprise 5 year mission was in the 24th century and not the 23rd. Because again, if you are so adamant that the past has to be changed, then why can’t that be the case with the future too to keep things on track with our current times? Roddenberry had no idea people would still be making Star Trek now, no one did. So then if you want to go down this rabbit hole then make it ALL consistent and fit with the flow of time, right?

Even if you don’t want the precious prime universe rebooted, you have to admit this makes things much easier instead of what they are setting up now which I guarantee will turn it into a bigger and confusing mess in the end since they can’t even keep to their own canon they set up as Picard season 2 made clear.

> But same time, people have to also just accept it’s all fiction too

Nobody thinks Star Trek is real. They do however hope it someday CAN be real.

Sure me too. But you still have to accept the show can’t present the ‘real world’ when it has ridiculously whacky things like the Eugenics War to begin with. I hope we can still make warp nine ships and all have the chance to make out with Orion girls WITHOUT multiple genocides happening before then. Maybe we can aspire to that instead. ;)

So then why waste time trying to match the show to our reality?

In another story thread, I mentioned that when I was a kid watching TOS I did like to believe that was potentially our timeline’s future. That of course was laughably ruined when TOS depicted a civilian Saturn V being used by the DoD to launch an orbital nuclear weapons platform in Assignment Earth which was of course pure fiction. As a space geek, I was dismayed haha. As an adult, TOS just became another fictional TV show with additional multiple historical errors like the NOMAD launch in 2002, etc., but i understand why some including Goldsman is trying to change the date of the Eugenics War and subsequent launch of the Botony Bay. Returning Trek to our timeline is perhaps a noble but ultimately fruitless endeavour. That said, I too like how you point out the potential benefits of changing canon as it frees up writers to make changes – something I am okay with AS LONG AS THE NEW STORY IS GOOD! Happy Fourth too all!!

I guess for me I was always one of the weirdos who never looked at the show as ‘real’ to our world but more as potential possibilities of what could happen. In other words maybe some of it will come true, others not so much. It’s just fun to see what they do get right but I’m not upset when they don’t either because it’s fiction, not a documentary. And chances are that ratio is probably 10/90 although that can be good too when it comes to chances of our planet being controlled by authoritarian supermen. ;)

But I never saw it as a direct relation because that’s just not realistic. Hollywood writers can’t predict the future, only what they think it could be. Those are two different things. And we have a flood of science fiction shows and movies whose predictions usually gets it way more wrong than right. And yet, no one seems bothered by this. Star Trek is not the only show out there making serious claims of how society will turn out. No one seems that bothered the Terminator movies still gets it very wrong lol…at least so far. ;) So, I don’t understand why anyone feel this show alone has to carry this burden? What other shows or movies do people feel also shares this responsibility? If you can’t name a single one, then it’s just more proof some fans take this show a little more seriously than they should. Just being honest.

But yes, I do think in the end this will be a good thing so I’m fine with the change, I just don’t care about this specific change. But if others do, that’s great, especially if it makes them enjoy the show more. And it will just be easier to deal with canon in the future and have the freedom to tell a story however they want.

Oh and thanks man and Happy Belated Canada Day! :)

I would honestly be surprised if there are that many fans who really think Star Trek is (or at least, STILL IS) in OUR timeline. I personally haven’t ever thought of it that way. I like that is connects back to our historic people, places and events, but (as has already been said) there’s been too many things that Star Trek has addressed since the 60’s that has never happened.

But what confuses me the most about the current era of Trek is how someone like Goldsman is going out of his way to try to convince everyone that one of the main points of Trek is that is connects to our history and therefore they are justified changing the timeline for the Eugenics Wars and beyond. BUT in the meantime, the Europa mission – which is a HUGE part of Picard season 2 – is supposed to be launching within a year and a half!! How can you create a HUGE PLOT DEVICE that is clearly fiction and not happening anytime soon, and then go out of your way to DESTROY canon just so you can keep Trek “in our timeline”??? I just don’t get it.

I’ve said it before and I’ll say it again, I’ve already made up my mind that SNW is in an alternate timeline and that the “Prime Timeline” as we knew it is gone. I just don’t know why they are trying so hard to just not admit it to themselves….

I agree. I think the majority of fans and casual fans don’t see Star Trek as our real world, at least not directly. Again, because too much of it has already changed as you said. I certainly don’t because the past Earth of Star Trek is ironically too depressing and cynical beyond what ours ever was. According to Q In a few decades its going to kill off all its lawyers and the military will be controlled through drugs. Yes all this still happens in ‘the future’ but I’m going to guess this will never happen on our planet.

But then on the flip side of that, we do have a few positive historical events happening in Star Trek’s Earth that is actually way ahead of us at this time like its space program. You mentioned the Europa flight (which I used as an example as well) which is suppose to happen next year and we know that idea is very absurd. We’re probably still decades away from sending manned flights to anywhere in our solar system outside of the moon and yet it was Goldsman himself who came up with that idea, so it’s bizarre and very contradictory. But same time it actually keeps with Star Trek’s history of space flight. On Star Trek’s Earth, the first manned mission to Saturn also takes place sometime in the early 21st century according to TOS. That probably should’ve happened already in fact. The first manned Mars manned mission is 2032 according to Voyager. That’s less than a decade away now too.

So ironically even though the Europa mission makes absolutely no sense in our reality today, it actually fits in perfectly with the progress of space travel in Star Trek’s chronology. Humans are already exploring the solar system in this time but we’re not even close to that reality yet. And then add the first Lunar colonies and the invention of warp travel which also suppose to happen in the 2060s which is obviously now within our lifetime.

And the other irony is we have to have these types of programs happening now in the Star Trek universe if we to believe a century from now Earth will now have the means and capabilities to transverse hundreds of solar systems and colonizing planets outside our solar system before the NX-01 even launches. And once that does, that number jumps to thousands of solar systems. So the writers of Picard actually did their homework, it all makes sense….for Star Trek’s history, but not our own.

So this is more proof that A. Star Trek is simply not our reality, not even close and B. that you can’t retcon all of it to fit current times without turning into a mess. That’s literally why I suggested in my OP if want to reconcile today’s real world history and progress with Star Trek, then you have to r-e-b-o-o-t it to align with the real world. Everything would probably have to be moved up a century and TOS wouldn’t start until the 24th century and TNG the 25th for example because we have now caught up to it’s future and we’re nowhere close to it, Eugenics War or not.

But then no one wants to do that and prefer to keep putting band aids on a bullet wound instead like Golsman is obviously trying to do; so I keep hitting my head against the proverbial brick wall.

And I agree, SNW is now in an alternate timeline. If you don’t want to believe that reality fine, but as I just proven, we can definitely say Star Trek is in an alternate timeline to our real world and has been for decades now even if the Eugenics war itself was never a thing. ;)

At the very least people have to admit I’m making a lot of sense here lol.

I won’t go so far as to say the prime timeline is “gone”. It’s still there waiting for competent writers and producers to go back there.

If writers & producers are incapable of operating in that world with those rules or feel the need to alter the existing prime universe to match their version then either say up front “this is our version of Pike’s Enterprise.” Or, “This is our version of a star ship some decade before TOS and is not a part of that universe.” Or, this is our version of Picard as an old man.” Or best yet, everything our production company makes is its own thing and any connection to any Star Trek that came before is pure coincidence. We aren’t trying to make any of it match.”

When I watched as a kid I knew it was a fake future. But it was still a positive one. One that was not ruined by the activities in “Assignment: Earth”. And it still wasn’t ruined when 1992 came and went with no Khan. Trek history was still Trek history and the inspirational and positive aspects of it still existed even when our real time passed stuff that Trek mentioned. Probably the biggest negative to our aspirational future came in the TNG pilot when they spoke about “post atomic horrors.” Which I HATED. One of the things I loved about Trek, especially in the 70’s when nearly all sci-fi revolved around nuclear annihilation was it it was probably the only sci-fi out there that did NOT predict nuclear holocaust. Which I never believed would happen, myself. I found that very positive. Then TNG had to go and ruin that right off the bat.

Sorry… I got off track at bit from my original comment. Which was, fiction set in our future don’t need to match our REAL future to be effective.

I have been talking about the same thing since the 80’s. It was apparent the timeline between Star Trek and us has divulged too far. We are supposed to have Warp Drive in 40 years. Khan in 1996. Colonel Christopher Jupiter mission around now. It’s going to get worse unless they address it. That said, I still have a problem with the Gorn showing up early. 👍

“That said, I still have a problem with the Gorn showing up early.”

But this is ultimately the issue. You can’t have your cake and eat it too (and I’m not talking about you specifically of course, just in general). But it’s all open season now. Now they can just say ‘Temporal Cold War’ and now the Gorn is invading Earth next season. When you open this kind of can of worms that you are using time travel as an excuse to change major historical events in canon, then everything can be in question, even centuries later.

Star Trek has always operated on the butterfly effect model of time travel. Incidentally that’s exactly why the reset button was used over and over again so they can keep saying none of it had a true effect to the rest of history. Now they can no longer say that and why this is obviously an altered timeline this show is living under.

I have been talking about the same thing since the 80’s. It was apparent the timeline between Star Trek and us has divulged too far. We are supposed to have Warp Drive in 40 years. Khan in 1996.

Isn’t it just fiction though? Star Trek isn’t real. 🤣

Yeah… I have the same Gorn problem. And both things really are mutually exclusive. Just because our reality doesn’t match Trek’s history doesn’t mean they get to more the first Gorn encounter as they see fit.

Unless, of course, they want to call it a REBOOT.

Is Akiva Goldsman full of crap? There is nothing to be corrected. It’s a fictional universe, it doesn’t have to align with ours completely.

Star Trek has a rich future history thay has been built over 5 decades,.is it going to be jettisoned just because we are getting near the time these they are meant to happen.

Be creative, use the lore, don’t erase it. Find creative ways to make the existing lore work.

There is no need to for personal insults. The producers are simply wanting to make the fictional Trekverse seem more “real” to reviewers by removing the glaring disjunction that there was no Eugenics War in the 1990s. I appreciate the effort toward verisimilitude. As it is, I think every Trek series has had its own time travel story to the 20th or 21st centuries. Maybe it’s time for a “time out” on them. One wonders why all these time travellers haven’t bumped in each other!

That dude always personally insults Akiva.

To be fair, they did use the lore. They used the concept of the TCW that has been based in canon for over 20 years to explain it. That’s being creative. It just sounds like some don’t like how it was used but he actually did what you claim he wasn’t doing.

Now if you just don’t like it, feel it’s erasing history instead of enhancing it, that’s fair. And I have been on record saying I wish they could just mooove on from Khan completely so we wouldn’t have these annoying debates at all. But same time this is Star Trek and they have done goofier things in the past (no pun intended ;)).

You could not be any more wrong on how Rodenberry set up Star Trek — he set is up as our possible future, not the Marvel Multiverse fantasy BS.

The biggest problem I have with Strange New Worlds is that it can’t do “Yes, and…”

Instead of constantly fiddling with the Gorn, Khan, etc., introduce new species and new places. Add on to the franchise’s narrative instead of reinterpreting what’s come before.

Agree with this as well. Make something new. I had the same problem with Picard too but at least none of it went against canon like this show.

To be fair when you go forward there are fewer restrictions on your show. No need to be concerned with what is coming in the future. Only what happened in the past.

Which exactly why going forward is always a better idea than going backwards IMO. And for me it will always be more exciting to get something completely new versus just ‘filling in’ to stuff we already know like a lot of prequels do. The whole Khan thing being the perfect example. Sigh

The irony is “Strange New Worlds” was given its name completely based on the idea that this was going to be a show that would explore… well… strange new worlds. That’s not to say that they haven’t shown us a few, but we’ve seen nothing that really has been all that groundbreaking. The end of the most recent season of Discovery was TRULY a strange new world, and I thought it was really interesting and a “big swing”. So far, it appears that SNW is more of a metaphor that actually means the exploration of new and existing characters and relationships. New aliens, planets, even technologies are all just being sidelined because for some reason, exploring the actors and their stories (which every series has done before within the course of the story) is apparently the most important thing.

I don’t think this group is capable of doing what you are suggesting. I really don’t.

How dare you ask Secret Hideout to “be creative”!

According to them, they understand Trek better than anyone and making the best Trek ever made!

Won’t we still just run into the Eugenics War again in ten or twenty years? I don’t mind that they moved it, but if just seems pointless to me.

They’ll need to do a complete reboot of the entire Trek franchise by then anyway — a pretty complete reimagining I would think. It’s already near laughable to watch TOS eps and watch SNW and not notice how low-tech and unrealistic, and how male-dominated, everything is in TOS — and I am saying this while having TOS as my all time fav Trek series. So the continuing with the canon today with all oi the pretending and rewrites that need to happen is already getting difficult, and there is no way that a 2060 Trek series, presumably in VR 3D, is still going to be able to claim it lines up with 1960s’ Trek or even 1980’s Trek. At some point that attempt to line it all up will become a complete joke.

You don’t need to reboot something just because the older entries are old. We all understand that technology and values evolve over time.

I’m talking about when you get like the unprecedented 100 year freaking point of the franchise, with say 25 series of future history sci-fi with thousands and thousands. Yeah, I think at that point you would want to do that — and the fans would want that by then as well. My opinion.

If the show is still running in 2063, then they might have to either reboot or use some more time travel shenanigans to move things around. Its still a little early to be worrying about that though.

I thought TV was going in 2040.

Goldsman is going to retcon that too in episode 5. ;)

Also agree it’s pointless but whatever.

Not a fan of taking an iconic franchise that has endured for over half a century and retroactively fixing it to make it feel more “real” when there’s no need to. I mean, what’s the point?

You just answered your own question — to make it more convincing and real.

If you want the story to be convincing and real, maybe don’t write a story where your main characters are able to check into a hotel without a credit card and sneak back and forth across international borders without any ID. Because chess money solves all those problems according to the script.

But you know the genetic superman being born in the 1960s instead of the 2010s is the beginning and end when it comes to believability, right?

Yet when the stuff in Pic S3 got nuts and Starwarsy, you had no issue with it???

We can go back and forth all we want here. But I don’t have one set of rules concerning realism for shows I like and a different set of rules for shows I dislike.

What exactly does it mean to go “Starwarsy”? Is it because they’re in space? I can’t work with your comment if you’re going to be that vague with your points.

The last two eps of Picard literally carbon copied ROTJ. I’ve covered this multiple times on comments in past articles, so I assume most have read this from me by now, but sure, here is the summary of this again:

In Picard S3, Data Calrissian did a great job with those crazy awesome piloting skills getting the Millennium-D into the center of the Death Cube to destroy it just as the Picardwalker father and son team clashed, but then shrugged off the negative controlling force and came to together to destroy Borg Queen Palpatine….all in parallel with Han and Princess Seven doing the the important support mission in the same system. More specifically:

The Emperor in the Death Star = Borg Queen in CubeLuke and Vader’ struggle with each other and then overcoming Palpatine = Picard and Jack’s struggle with each other and then overcoming Borg Queen. The supporting mission on Endor occurring in parallel with the Death Star ending events = the supporting mission near Earth by the Titan crew Jacks and Picards dark powers they must overcome as father and son = Vader and Luke’s dark powers they must overcome as father and son So we just sat through a season of Return of the Picard that I enjoyed for the TNG closure/fan service elements, and held my nose up at the Trek masquerading as Star Wars elements. I can live with that and accept the joy from the reunion elements that I got from it…but that is all I need in terms of more Star Wars-like stuff from this franchise.

If you’re that convinced I cannot help you. I’d rather have a Star Wars knock off as a TNG final than whatever Star Trek Nemesis was trying to be.

That’s just another part of why these writers are terrible. I was wondering how they crossed the border. Did they walk through a wilderness? All in a couple of days? With a few bucks they made from chess? Did they bribe customs agents? So many many issues with the episode they made only so their version can be the dominant one.

Why would we want to make Star Trek feel ‘convincing and real’? It’s a fictional show. To say that the stories told are “silly” because they don’t feel like they happened in “our” real history is like being upset that there is no Metropolis when doing a Superman series. Should we change the name to New York so that it doesn’t become “silly”?

The funny about your comment is that I doubt you even know that New York City was originally named New Amsterdam. :-)) Whoops! LOL

Additionally, Superman is fantasy, not science fiction, so that’s an invalid analogy anyway.

The funny about your comment is that I doubt you even know that New York City was originally named New Amsterdam. :-)) Whoops! LOL

You may never know.

Additionally, Superman is fantasy, not science fiction, so that’s an invalid analogy anyway.

You really want to stand on that hill? I know certain fantasies that use fungi to bring dead people back to life.

The hill has lumps and some areas that need mowing, but yeah, I’m fine to stand on it versus that trench with the runoff below.

True. But in this case, the point was to make their version the “real” version. They have ignored so much of TOS that they felt they needed to just go and say “ours is the prime time line now”.

Thank you for this article.

I didn’t have any problem with them moving the Khan event from the 1990s to the 21st century, and I completely understood why they wanted to do it. I remember growing up as a fan of Star Trek and imagining that it was in our universe and our future history. Not that I wanted anything like a eugenics war to happen or anything terrible like that, but it was still nice to imagine that the shows were our possible future and that did make them feel relevant for me. So, I totally get it.

I can still enjoy everything that came before and the TCW stuff is a good enough explanation for me why things have changed. I can still watch and accept Trouble with Tribbles even though DS9 replaced it on the timeline with Trials and Tribble-ations and I can still watch Space Seed and TWOK and accept that at one point those events mentioning the 1990s were correct, but now aren’t.

It’s all fiction after all and it doesn’t take much to headcanon it all together in the absence of an official explanation. And now we have an official explanation and I accept it. I appreciate the attempt at trying to keep Star Trek relevant for the current audience.

Well said. 100% agree.

I didn’t either and I didn’t like the episode that much either. So many dumb things happened in it. They are going to let a guy who stole a car go with the car?? Sigh, sadly hacks still make these shows. But they explained TCW changed stuff so that part is cool.

At least it’s not like Star Trek Into Dumbness where white Khan shows up and no one even notices.

I’m pretty hard om NuTrek at times but I give then credit when they at least try to have stuff makes sense.

And I never cared about the Eugenics war stuff.

OMG I didn’t think about the car thing until now lol. Yeah, people have pointed out to me how messy this episode was and I’m not talking about the Khan stuff. That actually made the most sense lol. I still liked it though.

And I like the idea of the Eugeics War, but it’s funny it gets brought up sooo much these days and yet they still seem embarrass to even show it. In STID, they had Khan and they still couldn’t be bothered to explain what the Eugenics War was to the newbies watching it. I can’t even remember if they even said the name in the movie (reason #47 it was ridiculous to even have him there if they never wanted to develop the guy). And that’s because they know how ridiculous the concept comes across in ANY time period. If the last 30 years taught us anything, it’s really that this kind of invasion happening is unrealistic today. It’s too many safeguards now and it actually shows we have progressed. Sadly we have things like the Ukraine invasion still happening but even that proves how different things are now because Putin really thought it would be like the old days and they can just swoop on in and take over a smaller country without any push back.

While we;re certainly not at Star Trek level, it proves democracy and progress is higher today even when we have people like Putin and Trump trying to test it as much as they are.

What’s interesting is that Goldsman says they already moved the Eugenics Wars to the 21st century back in season one. I guess that went unnoticed since I don’t recall reading any reactions about it. I certainly missed it.

And yes, the car thing was silly and looked more like product placement than anything else.

Someone else mentioned it happened in the first episode of the season when Pike is showing video of the world getting nuked to the aliens and that was around the time the Eugenics War happened too sometime in the 21st century.

And that’s confirmed because we see the January 6th video of MAGA Trumpers trying to take down America and threatening to kill Pence with their failed coup attempt and then all the other stuff supposedly came after that. Is it supposed to all be connected? Yeah probably!

That’s what Goldsman seems to be talking about.

The car scene was absolutely ridiculous and took me out of the show because of how dumb it was. 🙄

Video of riots in 2020-1 doesn’t confirm anything in Trek history. If they really wanted to show an honest to goodness coup they could have shown video from Myanmar in Feb of ’21.

Well it should. 😉

This is actually why I believe this was always an altered timeline because Goldsman basically confirmed this was in place since the show started; literally with the first episode. At the time, it just sounded more like a lazy retcon and they just pushed the date up maybe hoping no one will notice too much. ;)

But after the time travel stuff and Sera talking about the altercations it caused, it was obvious it was much more than that.

There is truth there. But they are just doing basically what Kurtzman & Orci did to create the KU. Alter the time line to create their own reboot show.

I still don’t know if this was their intent all along or if they realized how badly they screwed up and this was their attempt to make it all work. Well, their explanation essentially says their shows are all reboots more than they say ‘this is how we fixed things’.

Exactly. They are essentially creating a new timeline. Now I will say it is a bit different from the Kelvin universe since it does still happen in the Prime Universe, but it now gives them the freedom to change whatever they want. You can’t with a straight face say you can somehow change 30 years of history over the Eugenics War but then everything else stays the same.

But I do suspect unlike the KU, they will try and stick to the original canon as much as possible because they know if they go too far off the deep in, many fans will just consider it non canon to the Prime universe. But I know, you and others already think they have veered too far from the Prime timeline. I’m not really there yet but I won’t be shocked if that ends up being the case by the end of this season.

I honestly don’t think they have any intent to even try to stick within the rules. They didn’t before. Why would that change? And now they have this explanation that pretty much allows them to do anything they damn well want and still consider what they are doing “prime” or canonical. I promise, they will pick up on some small thing that happened on one TOS episode (and pat themselves on the back for noticing it foolishly thinking it will give them standing among the fans) and decide to run with it to the point that it ignores 20 other things in the Trek universe. But it is OK because… Time line changes or other.

As I said I wouldn’t be shocked if they didn’t, especially since they were already changing things anyway. I guess the question is how FAR will they go? I stated in the past the way they are treating canon now is basically stick to the broad strokes of what we know in TOS like ultimately Spock will still be with T’Pring, Kirk will still run into the Gorn later, etc. But now I wonder will they just totally ignore whatever they want and have Kirk and Pike fight the Gorn together as an example. I mentioned this in my OP they basically CAN do that now. But I suspect they will still keep to the broad strokes of things but we’ll see. I think the Gorn episode this season will give us a big heads up if really goes much bigger.

Since they pretty much admitted this is now an alternative time line, like the KU (cough *reboot*) they have essentially completely obliterated all of TOS and by extension everything that came after. Even TNG. No way can Arena still have happened. It just can’t. Their own explanation says it can’t. They are now free to run stories from TOS they way THEY feel they should be done.

I still stick to my idea that this was their way to completely free themselves from canon. All this did was make me wish they just called everything they did their own new rebooted Trek universe. Because that is what it is. The only thing left is for the people associated with creating this stuff to come out and outright say it.

Again you can be right. We’ll see. I just don’t know if they want to go that far with it but you’re right, nothing stops them now either.

Personally, I’ve been fine for the last 30 years with the idea that the Eugenics War was a fictional plot device that never actually happened. I get a quick chuckle every time I re-watch Wrath of Khan and get to that line where Montalban mentions 1996. It never detracts from the quality of that particular story. I remember 1982, and how at the time everyone had unrealistic expectations about the next two or three decades. (See also: Bladerunner. See also: Back to the Future Part II.)

Star Trek is full of predictions for the future that didn’t exactly pan out. Humpback whales haven’t gone extinct yet (ST IV actually did a lot of good PR for their cause) and Jackson Roykirk didn’t launch the Nomad probe in 2002. We don’t have sanctuary districts in 2023, therefore ST’s predictions for 2024 seem grim. And according to TNG there will be 52 stars on the U.S. flag by 2033, but the prospect of adding two more states is as unlikely now as it was in 1988.

Goldsman’s explanation about the date of the Eugenics War is fine for what it is, and not worth arguing about. This week’s episode was fun, and it wouldn’t have been as impactful without the La’an / Khan connection, and all right, so a fictional date has been reset. It remains as fictional as it was in 1966 and 1982.

But what gets me is this: the assumption that the Star Trek franchise is “broken” and that I therefore wake up early every Thursday morning in eager anticipation of seeing it “fixed” by these new shows. So what are we going to do when the Eugenics War doesn’t break out in 2032, thus invalidating even Goldsman’s version of events? Are we going to need yet another episode “saving” Star Trek with yet another ret-con?

Please, let’s focus instead on advancing the franchise forward and spending less time shoe-gazing at its past.

It’s only some fan’s getting all whiny about “oh no, there fixing Star Trek.” The producers are just trying to tell a good story and remain consistent with Rodenberry’s intent that, hey, this stuff could happen. So a few dates get updates, and so they might get updated again in 30 years…so freaking what?

2024 is gonna blow though. So they got that right.

Yeah it’s fiction. It’s not real history.

But if they want to change it fine as long as they come with a good reason and they did.

It’s just in an alternate timeline. Fixed.

That way you can watch TWOK and not think about why there are two different dates now.

I like the idea as well and there is nothing wrong to see it as an alternative timeline since none of it is real one way or the other.

But it’s just ridiculous to take fictional entertainment and treat it like some source of real history or think your fans will think less of a TV show just because it doesn’t align with real events. If you have to care about that, I think it’s more important to get the real historical events right than the fake ones.

We allll understand it’s not real, but we can still feel immersed in that world just the same. And note to Goldsman, if you are making your universe with great stories, strong characters and solid writing, they can still feel just as credible in that universe even if it doesn’t stack up to ours. And most people watch Star Trek for the possibilities, not for its ‘reality’ since very little of Star Trek has anything to do with reality.

We allll understand it’s not real, but we can still feel immersed in that world just the same. And note to Goldsman, if you are making your universe with great stories, strong characters and solid writing, they can still feel just as credible in that universe even if it doesn’t stack up to ours. And most people watch Star Trek for the possibilities, not for its ‘reality’ since very little of Star Trek has anything to do with reality.

No argument here.

Which is why I think this was their attempt to correct THEIR show. Not Trek in general.

Yeah… They are just opening yet another can of worms. They put themselves in the terrible position that the more early 21st century Trek predictions that don’t come the more they are going to have to “fix” their shows. What is more likely is this is a pathetic attempt to explain why their show is so amazingly out of sync with what came later. and they used a device Kurtzman already used to create a different Trek reboot, too.

This correction also includes the line; “… what used to be called Canada.”

Sorry, but could you explain?

It’s not stated explicitly, but the nation-state of Canada appears to have disappeared by time the United Earth government was created, although it’s still referred to by that name as a historic / geographic region.

It’s clear by passing references in TNG and other shows that Canadian cities and regions still exist (Calgary, Manitoba, Vancouver), but maybe it’s part of a greater North American sub-state in the UE context.

Sure, ok. But remember in TNG’s “Lower Decks” one of the young ensigns stated that Riker was Canadian, though he’s actually from Alaska. Note the clear borders drawn here. But hey, that’s one line.

I think this is just a TV show that tells stories. Let’s not lose any sleep over this.

You must be new here Mark. ;D

LOL, yeah, there is that. You make too much sense for our group here.

Aren’t you the guy super triggered Lower Decks is canon for over 3 years now? 🤣

It’s just a TV show that tell stories too.

Talk about hypocrisy.

Why are you addressing me? I have not addressed you in ages, per our mutual agreement.

Now that IS hypocrisy

Yeah you’re right but I couldn’t let that one go. You’re one of the biggest whiners here and complain about Lower Decks as if the show stole your wife or something but then you complain that others take a TV show too seriously? Really? People shouldn’t whine about stuff they don’t like just like you do everywhere? Maybe follow your advice then.

This is why I want to ignore you in the first place. Alright see ya.

You forgot to include emoticons in this post so that everyone can see you pat yourself on the back for how clever and amusing you are.

You’re right! Won’t happen again! 🙂👍

Good God get over it. None of this is real. Just enjoy the fact that we still get good Star Trek and move on. Nothing changes the old series…put in your DVD and watch it. See…..Khan is still Khan. Grow up.

Who is this aimed, at Goldsman or people not happy with it? Because it could be aimed at both lol.

LOL, great point!

In Star Trek Voyager, the crew traveled to a ’90s from an alternate timeline, created when Braxton crashed in the 1960s and was found by Starling. After they killed Starling, they reset the timeline and it never happened, as the second Braxton made clear when he literally told Janeway that he never experienced it.

I think that version of the 90s did still happen, but not to that version of Braxton. But then the two Braxtons were merged anyway.

The crazy Braxton came from a point in the future after the events of Relativity , when he became stricken with temporal psychosis. He was not the Braxton from Future’s End. Most likely than not it was that psychosis that allowed him to remember the events from this timeline even though he never lived through them. Temporal psychosis was not that well defined, which allows for such a thing to be true.

Both versions of Braxton from Relativity remembered Future’s End. They mentioned reintegrating alternate versions together. I always assumed that meant they were just Tuvixing them together.

Could be, but Braxton himself stated that he never lived through that timeline. Ergo, his having memories from it must be due to his temporal psychosis.

As I started below, when Braxton reappeared at the end of part two he was onboard the same ship he was on in part one, right?

If so, that ship couldn’t have crashed in 1967, where Starling found it, and, later, been destroyed in the 1990s.

If the ship never went back in time, then Starling couldn’t have reversed engineered its technology to create Chronowerks.

In truth, the second part of Future’s End should have concluded with a reset similar to the one in Time & Again, with Voyager in the Delta Quadrant and the crew having no memory of what happened, just like it happened in that episode.

After Braxton said that he didn’t remember those events at the end of Future’s End, they picked up the other version of Braxton that was wandering around LA and merged the two together.

He didn’t say that he didn’t remember them. He said he didn’t experience that timeline.

How could there have been another Braxton when that timeline never existed, having been erased when Voyager destroyed Braxton’s ship when Starling tried to take it to the future?

One theory I heard today from a poster on YouTube was really interesting and tied those Voyager episode, Picard season 2 and this one together. Essentially the Eugenics war didn’t happen as you said because Braxton traveled back to the past and just delayed those events and why we never saw or heard about any remnants of the Eugeniics War when Voyager arrived. But when Sterling was killed, the company went another direction and genetic engineering became their new focus and how the Khan project was born which we saw Soong holding up in Picard season 2; also the same year Sterling was killed.

We could later learn he was the one who had previously worked for Sterling with his cloning experiments and genetic engineering became part of the company, just in secret of course. They weren’t part of the original experiments but their involvement helps push the timeline a closer like before and how Khan came to be in the 2010s.

Obviously it’s all just fan fiction but it actually could work if they didn’t just want to use ‘Temporal Wars’ as the cause and something much more specific and part of past and preset canon.

Except that if the timeline reset and Starling never found Braxton’s ship then Chronowerx never existed, though. Yes, despite the seeming appearance of one of their laptops in a later episode of Voyager. It had to have been a mistake.

But I don’t think the timeline totally reset though because the Doctor still had his mobile emitter which Sterling created with 29th century tech. So there is obviously room there or that would’ve disappeared too.

The emitter probably remained for the same reason that Voyager did in the 20th Century and the crew remembered what happened.

Let us look at it from another perspective.

When Braxton reappeared at the end of part two he was onboard the same ship he was on in part one, right?

If so, that ship couldn’t have crashed in 1967, where Starling found it, and, later, been destroyed in the 1990s.

If the ship never went back in time, then Starling couldn’t have reversed engineered its technology to create Chronowerks.

In truth, the second part of Future’s End should have concluded with a reset similar to the one in Time & Again, with Voyager in the Delta Quadrant and the crew having no memory of what happened, just like it happened in that episode.

Yeah OK, again it’s just a fan speculation, so not a huge deal. I don’t really disagree with your points at all,, but it’s still Star Trek and they really wanted to find a way…they would find a way lol.

But obviously none of this is connected.

That’s as good an explanation as any.

I think there is a problem with moving the Eugenic Wars 30, 40 years to the future: this ALREADY IS a thing that CHANGES EVERYTHING.

There is no way you move something so big and nothing changes. It is like move Hitler’s ascension to 1963 and pretend nothing changes with it. The people fighint changes, the deaths change, the tecnology of the war changes, until the end of the war could change.

In reality, no. In fiction, of course you can do all of this.

I think this if far beyond the suspension of disbelief

No, it’s the exact opposite. By updating the timeline it increases ones ability to suspend disbelief that some of the science fiction they are saying could possibly happen in one form or another one day.

Dumbass stuff that takes one out of the ep, like wondering, “wait, I lived in the 90’s and their were no Eugenics Wars?” don’t need to continue for all the near future shows…just update it and move on. And that’s exactly what they are doing.

The whiners need to stop bitching and moaning about it — this is a necessary correct to the timeline that should not really be a big deal at all.

Except that no one was really whining about the Eugenics Wars taking place in the 90’s or Star Trek being in “our timeline” until this episode brought it front and center. It seems to me that pretty much everyone on these message boards’ “suspension of disbelief” was in a MUCH BETTER place prior to “Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow”.

What many people HAVE been whining about is that SNW is taking canon and throwing it out the window. And I’m FINE with that if they just establish this is a whole new timeline, and then who cares when the Eugenics Wars took place?

If they really want people to see this as “our timeline”, then just leave well enough alone and come up with new story ideas that don’t need to mess with other stories that were done well enough the first time.

And if “updating the timeline” is really that necessary, tie it into a story point that matters. Not just an excuse for a crew member to not feel lonely and expand a backstory. That could have still been done while writing an entirely original story.

Fully agree. I said it somewhere else, while I don’t mind the idea, it’s just fan service of the worst kind because A. it’s ‘correcting’ something most people never cared about correcting in the first place because most of us recognize its just fiction and B. It has nothing to do with SNW as a show. Sure they found a way to tie it into La’an’s story, but it feels very forced for obvious reasons. But then everything about La’an’s character and backstory feels very forced lol.

But this feels too much like a TOS story line than a SNW one which is the real problem with this show. It’s just focused too much on what TOS created but not trying to create anything new in itself. Again, if it had more than 10 episodes a season, then it would probably be fine. I’m not surprised by it obviously but when you build an entire episode around Captain Kirk and a Khan descendant, that’s another blatant example its being too focused on the wrong show IMO even if you liked the episode.

Imagine on DS9, the third episode of season 2 had Captain Picard and O’Brien together dealing with a secret mission with the Cardassians or Romulans and all the characters the show is suppose to be about are barely shown or not even relevant to the story. That’s basically what this episode felt like.

This doesn’t feel like a TOS story to me at all. There were two in the first season that felt like it was something TOS might have done. (and for sure would have done them better) But for the most part this show feels more like everything else Secret Hideout has made far more than anything TOS might have done. TNG had tons of episodes that felt like they would have worked with TOS, BTW.

Dude, I’ve been bringing up the eugenics wars timeline issue for years on this site and other fans have agreed with me on this issue… Again going back years, so way before this ep. And I also recall major discussions about this when Star Trek into darkness came out, for obvious reasons

That’s yet another thing. I don’t recall hearing over the years about Trek fans annoyed the Eugenics wars never happened. If anything it’s just a bit of a laugh. But seems to me fans accept Trek history as different from reality. Because we know it’s fiction.

This is Goldsman deciding he needed to fix something that was never broken. Which is why I still cling to my theory that he only did this because he and his staff are so creatively bankrupt that they are incapable of writing stories that hold to the rules that Trek created for that time frame. It has nothing to do with GR’s vision or any other such hogwash. It’s only so he can lamely cover his a$$.

“That’s yet another thing. I don’t recall hearing over the years about Trek fans annoyed the Eugenics wars never happened. If anything it’s just a bit of a laugh. But seems to me fans accept Trek history as different from reality. Because we know it’s fiction.”

Never once have I heard this either. Even more proof, we been talking about Augments and Khan since 2013 thanks to STID, Picard season 2 and now this show and the actual date of the war rarely comes up at all. With regards to Picard, if anything people were legitimately upset with Matalas answer when he said that the Eugenics War probably happened later and that Spock got the time mixed up.

So most fans didn’t care and had no problem with keeping it in the 90s. And it probably has to do with the fact in real time, it’s now been over 30 years lol. That’s a loooooong time. People have came to the realization that yeah, Star Trek isn’t real so it didn’t matter anyway.

They already said it did change things because of the TCW. Makes sense. We just don’t know how much.

Fascism would still be a problem, with or without Hitler. If nothing else, someone else would have taken up the mantle.

The Eugenics Wars in the 1990’s is one of countless examples of Star Trek history being different than our own. To view that as something that needs to be “corrected” or practical to address is nonsensical. Even Season 2 of Picard had enough sense to recognize that our history =/= Trek history. Even J.J. Abrams knew how reboot something while leaving the original intact.

Nope. It needs to be periodically updated so that it can remain a possible future for all of us — exactly as GR intended.

You don’t have to like it, but this it what is happening here, and it’s going to keep happening. I suggest you either stay on the train, or get off at the next station. :-)

It’s ridiculous. And they will probably turn it into a bigger mess in the end. But I do think it’s creative, but unnecessary

Well, this show is basically doing what JJ did. And Kurtzman was one of the writers who did it. So SNW is stealing from Kurtzman, essentially.

But SNW isn’t in a different universe. But the idea is definitely similar.

But if Pike starts blasting Beastie Boys off duty, we’re in trouble. 🤣

By claiming all the time changes they have come as close as one can get to admitting this is a reboot/alternate reality as one can get without actually admitting it’s a reboot/alternate reality. At least the KU films had the balls to full on admit that is what they were doing. These weasels can’t even bring themselves to say it.

We may not hear the Beastie Boys but I’d wager dollars to doughnuts Kurtzman probably really wants too…

This is exactly what I said the other day here on a previous article on this ep — that Rodenberry intended the Star Trek timeline to be OUR FUTURE — and I got crucified for it.

It’s nice when those that control canon prove me 100% right

I mean, I gotta accept that Lower Decks is canon because CBS and their producers say it is, so those that love that show while not liking this canon timeline correction will just have to grin and bear it like I do with the juvenile cartoon sitcom events and drama being part of the future history.

Roddenberry (and Goldsman and Co. for that matter) and canon are two different things . If Roddenberry had appeared in Star Trek (even if it was some sort of news clipping, flashback, etc.), then it would be canon. Since he didn’t, it really doesn’t matter what his intention was, and there’s nothing that’s happened on screen to outright say that we are in the same timeline. In fact, there’s been enough differences through the series to say the exact opposite.

Even so, this article and Goldsman’s comments are still just extrapolating Roddenberry’s vision based on quotes that don’t directly say that Roddenberry placed Star Trek exactly in our timeline. In fact, all he really seems to say in the quotes in the article is that he tried to RELATE it to our reality in hopes of people seeing that our future could be a positive one and things could improve. I don’t think he really believed that we would form Starfleet and launch the Enterprise. He did, however, hope that humanity would get past its current problems and focus on bettering ourselves and thinking beyond the confines of our planet.

Trying to say that he truly believed that a group of superhumans would try to take over the world is not anywhere close to true, and I doubt he really believed that time traveling humans were coming back to the 1960’s, 80’s, 90’s, or 2000’s to try to make right what once went wrong. He knew it was fiction and a fictional timeline. He just wanted to make it more realistic than Buck Rodgers and other contemporary sci-fi shows that didn’t connect with reality.

Dude, GR himself updated the Star Trek science fiction future himself in TMP. TMP Trek universe looks vastly different than TOS Trek universe. He updated the ships, the aliens l, starfleet, the technology, and pretty much everything we saw on screen. And not only that, in the next generation, he changed the warp factors, with work 10 being a new maximum.

GR would be the last person to gripe about updating in the timeline for events to keep it consistent with our current set of events and recent past. It has nothing to do with him claiming to predict perfectly future events (of course he wasn’t doing that and of course I wasn’t suggesting that), but it certainly has to do with making common sense updates to the timeline so that it can still be a potential science fiction future for all of us today.

That’s what you and others don’t seem to be understanding. It’s not really all that complicated and it’s not really that big of a deal. You all need to chill out and relax…It’s going to be okay, lol

Of course he updated the look for TMP. They had millions of dollars more at their disposal to update sets, special effects, make up, and anything else. They also had to compete against 2001 and Star Wars. I believe GR himself said if they had the money and time, the tv Klingons would’ve looked different, and more in line with the movie.

Personally, I found the in-universe explanation for the Klingon look was silly. I think most of us understood with more money, and advances in makeup, updating the look was a logical step. Half the time it’s the writers complicating things, not the fans.

Exactly — well said!

This is a dumb reason to alter the canon of the show.

The previous iteration has been part of the franchise for 56 YEARS ! It didn’t bother me that we didn’t suffer through the Eugenics Wars and Khan’s rule when I was a kid watching Deep Space Nine , because I understood I was watching fiction. Doctor Who , which is just as much a cultural signifier to British audiences as a science-fiction series that explored the human condition as Star Trek is to American audiences, isn’t undermined because the Daleks never invaded London in the 1960s.

This is why I find the “updating for modern audiences” excuse really stupid. People that like and love Star Trek will accept all of the weirdness and cardboard sets that came before because it’s a part of Star Trek , the same way Who fans accept the Doctors with question marks on their clothes who wore celery as a fashion accessory and stopped multiple alien invasions of Earth that never happened.

“ And it’s not just the new shows. In 1996 Star Trek: Voyager traveled back to contemporary Los Angeles for the two-part episode “Future’s End,” with no mention or evidence of any Eugenics Wars (or aftermath) to be seen. “

That’s not exactly true. Images of the DY-100 sleeper ship, Botany Bay, appear in those episodes.

Yet you are the dude who acted so defensive when a number of us pointed out all the Star Wars science fantasy-BS and stuff inconsistent with TNG in Picard S3? Now suddenly your a traditionalist for adhering to other Star Trek elements?

I can’t keep up with you, dude? LOL

Ah yes, aren’t you the guy that cries a little inside every time someone says something nice about Matalas. LMAO

If you need the plot of a near 60-year old story within a fictional TV show altered in order for you to find “aspiration” and for it to be “real,” that says a lot more about the whacked out creative decisions of Akiva Goldsman and the skewed priorities of the people praising this mess than it does about the quality of the writing or having a cohesive narrative.

If you need the plot of a 56-year old story within a fictional TV show altered in order for you to find “aspiration” and for it to be “real,” that says a lot more about other things than it does about the quality of the writing or having a cohesive narrative.

Nah, it just says I want some details changed just so laughable shit (especially for new generations of fans being brought in by the new shows) doesn’t show up to make it seem like Trek doesn’t take place in the Marvel Multiverse.

Weird how you give a free pass to space zombies, the D flying around like the Millenium Falcon, and Picard’s son having The Force-like powers in Picard, but these date changes in a couple SNW eps just to keep the timeline from looking too silly really bother you? Wow!

Yeah, I’d agree there is a problem if one can no longer be inspired by the positive aspects a show presents just because real events don’t follow how that fictional show presented them to go.

I keep saying that Star Trek has to be presented as our possible future, or else it ceases to be aspirational. That means periodic recalibration is inevitable. That said, I would have preferred Greg Cox’s approach, as I thought that was a really elegant solution, by saying the Eugenics Wars were a label retroactively attached to events that already happened in the real world.

I keep saying that Star Trek has to be presented as our possible future, or else it ceases to be aspirational. That means periodic recalibration is inevitable.

Well said! Also, I did like Greg Cox’s take.

I’m sorry Eric, but I just don’t buy this at all. The Eugenics War was suppose to happen 30 years ago in our real time. There has been tons of Star Trek since. The show has also gained millions of new fans too, mostly in the 90s itself when surprisingly our planet wasn’t attacked by superhumans.

And oddly enough Star Trek still managed to be ‘aspirational’ just the same in all this time. Again, I’m not bothered by the move in itself, I think it’s very creative in fact. But it’s silly to suggest people can’t separate fake history from real history on a TV show and now can’t feel inspired over it. I don’t know a single person whose had that problem in the last 30 years, including new fans. So I have no idea what Goldsman is on about?

I love Star Trek, but it’s sci fin hokum. The very idea you have genetically advanced super humans taking over a quarter of the planet should tell people that lol. Show of hands, do anyone think this is actually possible in our real world? If the answer is ‘no’, then it goes back to the reality it’s just fiction then, right? It’s ridiculous but it makes for a fun story. But that’s all it is, a s-t-o-r-y!

But if it takes some fans to feel connected because of it, fine, but these people should maybe watch less TV shows and focus more on real life if that’s the case. Just being very honest.

The way I prefer to look at Trek’s future is that while it needs to be inspirational I am also glad that some of the predictions it made didn’t come true. Maybe this is a sign that as humans we are improving as a species (albeit more slowly than Trek anticipated). In order to make it more asprational for the future it needs to make new and bolder predictions about the future, not re-heat what came before.

exaclty. the Khan books dealt with this issue very smoothly already. It was all happening behind the scenes and under the radar. That’s how a real writer works a new story into existing lore. Ive said this about Trek and what’s happening over at Disney with Star Wars. Their refusal to hire actual writers who have a proven track record in crafting good stories within the existing framework (and actually enjoy the challenge) is mind-boggling.

No, Eric. I find that ridiculous. Tons of fantasy is inspirational. Just because it’s not real doesn’t make it any less so. Trek was always a fiction. It held up a world we might hope to achieve. Does it really matter that atrocities they claimed took place never did in reality? Maybe it does to you but I doubt it does for most.

When it comes to Star Trek time travel episodes and the many ways they inevitably contradict previously established canon, I suggest following the Kathryn Janeway Philosophy of Temporal Mechanics: “ My advice on making sense of temporal paradoxes is simple: don’t even try.”

I don’t care either way. Now that SNW is an alternate timeline that will make things easier for sone fans to accept it more.

Maybe we will get more TCW stories too. That would be cool.

I understand the frustration at changing the established dates of the Khan cafuffle. But this episode did go out of its way to say that the date it happens makes no impact on history. The 29th century time chart identical to Relativity and the upcoming Lower Decks crossover keep us cemented in the timeline we know. It does also help explain the normality of 1996 when Voyager traveled back there in Future Tense. Admittedly the 1996 Project Khan file Adam Soong was looking at is a little trickier to work out at 3am but it’s doable.

“Names, dates, places. It’s all open to interpretation who’s to say what really happened” a little suspension of disbelief, a small amount of mental gymnastics and ignoring the odd line of dialogue (which let’s face it is not a new practice lest we try and work out how the eugenics wars was in the 2100s) and you’ll be fine.

This is probably the dumbest thing ever in the star trek universe, and that’s saying a lot. Goldman’s explanation is ridiculous, of course star trek was never supposed to be a prediction of things to come in our universe. Only really good writers should attempt a time travel story, and these morons aren’t that. The whole 2nd season of SNW is a joke, I’ll never waste my time with it again

I’m enjoying season 2 but I can’t disagree with your points either. What if we only had TOS and nothing else? Are people going to tell me they would stop watching reruns of the show today because they got their fake future wrong? It’s so ridiculous on its head. It’s science fiction, emphasis on fiction .

I don’t know… But it certainly does rival the Lorca reveal.

The real question is how many different Kirks are we going to see?

LOL next time we’ll be on the third version, but at least the correct one. ;)

To quote the man himself, “We find the one quite sufficient.”

Goldsman can make this all go away by simply declaring that Strange New Worlds is an alternate Star Trek. Simple as that. No one will be upset then. He’s got a good show on his hands that is true to the spirit of Star Trek. We don’t mind it being ‘alternate.’

Insisting that its canon just pushes the idea that Goldsman is obsessed with leaving his ‘mark’ on Star Trek forever and ever. Its not necessary, its divisive. Just let SNW be its own thing, keep making a good series, and everyone will be happy.

For most people, this move makes it an alternate timeline anyway if you have two different Khans born at different times. Now three Khans when you include the British version in the other universe. ;)

What Goldsman is doing we’ve seen before – Chris Chibnall nearly Ruined DOCTOR WHO with his obsession to put HIS Mark on it and the BBC had to bring back Russell T Davies to fix it…which from all accounts (leaks, clips, photos) he’s going to! pull it off! Maybe it’s time to ask Rick Berman back…say what you will, the man kept STAR TREK Going for more than a decade and a half after Gene Died and Bennett bailed.

Berman era is easily by far my favorite and it obviously still has a huge influence on the franchise today. But looking at what these new shows are today, one thing I really do appreciate about that time, especially now, is they did try very hard to make every show feel like its own with all original characters, new aliens, etc. Yes they certainly fell back on fan service, most which I loved, but it was done in moderation and they were producing 50 episodes a year.

I’m not complaining, I like most of the shows now and happy to have legacy characters like Pike, Picard and Janeway back and Picard season 3 was great. But I wish we can have shows that can just do their own thing like the old days and not focus on so much nostalgia but creating new things like those shows tried to do a bit more often. I guess we have Discovery for that now and I like it’s in a very different time period for a change, but it’s been a huge disappointment for me and that’s being kind.

And while I like Kurtzman Trek, I don’t see it lasting 18 years the way things are looking right now and two shows have already been cancelled. But maybe it has a chance to reach a decade at least and that would be considered a success.

Honestly if they are going to bring back a previous show runner my vote would be for Manny Coto. In his short time at the helm he showed he not only knows his Trek but is very reverential to the lore.

But to me, just getting this out of the hands of Secret Hideout would be considered a win.

exactly. If they just admit it’s a different timeline then all is well. Go crazy.

After all his timey-whiney and ridiculous mental gymnastics he went through to try and make his square peg fit in the round hole I think we can safely say his personal ego will NEVER allow him to admit this an alternate reality. Let alone a reboot.

Star Trek is fictional. It can be aspirational without being made current to today’s timeline. Better that it isn’t in our timeline so they can be more creative. As for Khan and the dystopian events of the 90s, according to the Cushman books, Roddenberry himself named Khan and added the dictatorial backstory, which the second season episode “Bread and Circuses” also referenced.

from healthline.com

“If you inhale something instead of swallowing it or if stomach contents back up and enter your airway, you experience aspiration . Some people may experience complications, including infections. Aspiration means inhaling some kind of foreign object or substance into your airway. Usually, it’s food, saliva, or stomach contents that make their way into your lungs when you swallow, vomit, or experience heartburn.”

For my money, Star Trek is already so aspiration al, it’s likely to kill me.

I’m just referencing the producer’s quote above. Personally, I wish they’d concentrate on making good solid entertainment. Love the show, but entertainment is primarily what I’m looking for.first.

Biggest bull**** since Chris Chibnall created “The Timeless Child” and tossed out 57 years old “Doctor Who” history and continuity.

Goldsman may have won an Oscar, but let’s not forget he wrote “Batman and Robin” and derailed a franchise for years…which had to start from square one…

As if Dr. Who is something to be taken seriously…lol

Goldsman won an oscar?? wow.

It wasn’t in the mirror universe? 🤪🙄

It’s “Oscar.” And he’s also won a Golden Globe for a screenplay, and two BAFTA’s for screenplays. You can put that all in your little red wagon of cynically, boorish negativity. :-)

Oh Gene what have you done creating this star trek thing that has everyone tying themseleves up in knots tryin figure out its timelines!

Is it me or does Akiva Goldsman come across as a complete ass anytime he speaks on this show? He just seems uber defensive as if he knows what he’s saying and the content of the episodes are going to rankle fans

Here’s the level of logic we’re dealing with here: Goldsman felt it was necessary to alter a 60-year old story about a genetic superman for believability and aspiration, but in the same episode he didn’t worry about the story believability of 2 people hopping back and forth across an international border and staying in a hotel suit with no id and nothing except their chess money.

Also, it’s a 14 hour drive round-trip Toronto to Vermont, but you know you can take a taxi there.

When you’re used to making massive plot cheats and committing teleplay seppuku with the network’s blessing and a deal extension, you don’t give a second thought to real-world aspects — either for research or then to just ignore what you find — while doing that particular brand of ‘screenwriting.’ It’s all about attaining your result, then backtracking over everything between that and the start point, and about as dishonest as a scientist performing an experiment, then changing his hypothesis to fit the result.

Exactly. What really hit me on my second watch was just how much they just forced pieces around to get to the ending. Like Sera herself, it’s such a bizarre coincidence they meet her at ground zero of the explosion but then she randomly shows up again. OK at this point you can just buy she’s following them. But then, for some strange reason disappears again after telling them her ‘crazy’ conspiracy theory and leaves. So at this point we have to believe they went all the way to Vermont to meet Pelia but then when they arrive back in Toronto she’s following them again? Did she have a tracker on one of them or was just literally waiting for them to make their move to the laboratory? Or are we suppose to be believe she followed them to Vermont as well?

I really loved the Pelia scene but it just makes it more messy when you add the time crunch as you said but now with Sera supposedly watching them when they get back. In reality, they could’ve cut ALL that out and have Sera meet them the second time and manipulate them to get to the lab since that was the whole point.

But it just felt like they had to extend the episode instead of just naturally building up to the ending and a lot of plotholes along the way with the car, Vermont, Sera and the hotel.

Thank goodness no one here exhibits those traits.

You know, all this headache could have been avoided if they simply didn’t have a descendant of Khan on board. Why was this character even necessary beyond the name recognition? Shouldn’t Star Trek move past Khan by now? I sometimes feel like he is only big-name bad guy of the show. Yes, we have the Borg and Klingons and Romulans but I feel like Star Trek needs to introduce another NEW, MEMORABLE big bad character. I mean it shouldn’t be that hard right?

Bc its KHAAAAN! and The Wrath of Khan is like the best movie evver! And that Khaaan! meme from the movie is twitter iconic!

Soooooooo true!

It still makes no sense. But I honestly think they gave the character that name to just somehow squeeze Khan in one way or another and we got it in this episode.

No one is begging for more Khan. For most fans, the character died long ago and had no problem just moving on. To be honest, they probably would love to just pull a Star Trek resurrection and make him alive again and a big villain of the franchise. But that’s hard to do when he’s on a ship that blew up in a million pieces….so we get this stuff instead.

If you want another boogeyman for the franchise, then just create one instead of characters or species that is either already dead or not suppose to meet until yeas later. Provide something new they can really play with instead of teetering around the edges of 55 year old canon.

Khan Resurrection would be relatively easy to pull out the hat, simply have it revealed via flashback scene that Khan was reborn on Genesis after Reliant went boom, and kid Khan was khanapped by Romulans before Grissom found Spock, put in cryofreeze for a century he’s eventually defrosted and ages 35 years, working as an underground Romulan assassin; until takes on Picard and TNG in their 1st P+ movie! “Star Trek The Vengeance of Khan”

Dude don’t give these people anymore ideas.

And judging by this board, people are just really sick of Khan and this is primarily a very pro-TOS board. The problem with Khan is he’s a very one note character and his entire history has been told. He’s obviously a great character but canon makes it very hard to do much with him and everyone seem to acknowledge that accept for the people making Star Trek today and fanboys like Goldsman. I’m 100% certain La’an is named Noonian Singh is due to this guy. (sigh)

Their best chance to really give Khan a new life was obviously STID and we saw how badly they screwed that up. So just move on. Most of us have literally decades ago.

The fact that La’an is a Noonien-Soong is so inessential to the character (outside of this week’s episode) that it really reinforces my belief that her being so is simply pointless fan service. They could have really made it work in last season’s “Ghosts of Illyria”. But outside of being pissed at Una for one scene, they did absolutely nothing with it.

As it stands, La’an is the only character on the show I care a whit about, but she’s lumbered with this needless legacy connection that is just tired at this point.

I agree this is dumb. Also, it’s a budget saving device so they never have to show what a 1990s Eugenics War would really look like.

Creating a controversy is another way to waste or occupy our minds with stuff about Star Trek that shouldn’t even matter. What should matter is original, thought provoking stories in the Star Trek world that already exists. That should be the minimum Star Trek work requirement.

That 1990 eugenics war was already broken by enterprise with carpenter street and maybe also with DS9. It’s a TV show it can’t keep stuck to old stuff or you can’t do anything with it. If it followed TOS every ship in the federation could easilly travel in time.

I thought the DS9 Bell Riots episode pretty much confirmed the original timeline with no problems. Is that what you mean? I’ll look again at Carpenter Street.

The thing I am saying is that creative writers can do anything: The Eugenics War could be a secret war — or a war in an unseen part of the world that “we” don’t see as living during that time period.

For example, would anyone on the streets of NYC know anything about King Leopold’s genocidal war in Africa as it was happening? I think not.

Right now, outside of the Russian War on Ukraine, what do people really know about the conflicts that are going on right now?

In TOS Kirk mentions the Armenian genocide.. that was one of the first mentions of it on TV.

They didn’t have to change a thing.

Also, given the very limited ways they are showing planets and cultures, a very hermetically sealed Eugenics Wars in our immediate past could have been very cost-effective, fan servicing, and freaking interesting.

Was it? Not seeing how….

Especially for something that doesn’t even matter to the show itself. That’s another reason this feels so eye rolling. It’s 300 years in the past from where the show takes place, so who really cares??? How does this change affect the show and its characters? This is ‘fan service’ in the cringiest way possible. You’re moving up a date to a fake event so fans can feel more ‘inspired’ by it? Sorry, it just sounds like a load of B.S. and most likely something Goldsman wanted to do because he’s way too obsessed with Khan.

And another reason this show feels more like a TOS prequel than an actual Pike show at times because it’s waaaaay too focused on stuff we got in TOS instead of concentrating more on how to make their own show stand out with its own mythology and elements.

If we had 25 episodes like the old days, you can take a detour to do stuff like this. With just ten though, I think it would be better to have stories that matters in the actual present or sets up the future and not the past.

Absolutely. #whereispike? I hope they deliver.

Why are we so obsessed as to when Picard and SNW have set the potential eugenics war when we’re skimming over his point that Voyager went back to 1996 and there was no mention of the eugenics war

Because there’s an investment here in the idea that the things people don’t like about post-ENT are *unique* to it among iterations of Star Trek.

… this was addressed back by the writers of that episode in a magazine interview… because Eugenics Wars in Trek canon *ended* in 1996…. after they arrived.

And the bulk of the wars as written in non-canon novels took place in Asia and the Middle East.

There was nothing concrete to say that the area of Los Angeles the episode took place was re-built or unaffected.

That IS a bit of a tiny cop-out… but it’s slightly logical nonetheless.

The cool part is that we pretty much literally saw this play out on screen in the second episode of the fourth season of Enterprise when Daniels showed Archer the timeline resetting after they stopped Vosk from traveling forward in time and ended the Temporal Wars.

The more Goldsman tries to justify what SNW is doing with whatever timeline this is now, the less interested I become. How about leaving the whole Khan thing alone to begin with and writing something NEW and original?? This is getting boring. And canon, forget about it.

That’s way too risky for the beancounters. You have to revisit “fan favorite” material, or do something topical and socio-politically relevant. Otherwise the audience might not be interested, and then how would they recoup their costs?

Why try to compete on innovation when you well understand your own creative bankruptcy? That’s a loser’s fight.

Don’t get the Khan thing at all? They killed that guy off in the Regan era. Most people here don’t seem to care either. Just a weird thing to focus on.

As pretty much always Danpaine, once again we agree! And we’re both old school TOS fans.

The problem isn’t canon. The problem is the writing and the choices they make. When this show was announced, we all thought we were getting a show that was about exploring worlds and big ideas. They started off that way but have now course corrected to whatever S2 is supposed to be. The season has been disappointing. Hopefully, it gets better.

Also, this is an alternate timeline. It doesn’t affect TOS at all. So, as long as the stories are good, they can do what they want.

Yes. It’s the choices the writers made. In the first season they really screwed with Trek history with the Gorn and Spcok-Chapel & such. They probably realized what they did. Now AG feels he needs to “fix” his show to make it work. Now, he can’t say HIS show was messed up. No way. He’s making the best Trek EVER! No, it has to be the rest of Trek that is wrong. So this “fixes” THEIR problems for them.

I’m sure he’s waiting to issue a huge “You’re welcome” to all the grateful fans he thinks he created.

So fine, do some timey wimey handwaving to align Trek history with the actual current state of things. Honestly, I’m not against that.

And then create a totally fictional “Lake Ontario Bridge” going into present-day Toronto to screw up that message.

Also, I’d love to know how Spock actually existed in alternate future time, given that he was a product of Sarek and Amanda, and it looks like the Vulcans and Humans are not really best friends.

It makes more sense than Mirror Spock existing. I don’t think a lot of Terrans would want to dirty their bloodline by mating with a Vulcan.

This all goes back to Deep Space Nine. When Siskos cast went back to Gabriel Bells time it moved the time of the Eugenics War to the 21st century time. I keep seeing people claiming Strange New World changes things but that aint the case. DS9 changed it a long time ago an this is just the old new norm. I read a good article on this: https://richhandley.com/2023/06/30/its-been-a-long-road-getting-from-there-to-here/

This is an odd justification from someone who is producing a show that at some level is trying to adhere to the same style and technological advances predicted by a show that premiered in 1966.

Getting tired of revisiting Khan. This was supposed to be Pike’s Enterprise, and the title of the show is “Strange New Worlds”. How about let’s have a little more of that….

Right…three (2 mediocre, and #1 was terrible, imo) episodes in, and where’s Pike? It’s his E, right? Anson Mount’s talent, being wasted.

Anson Mount had just become a new father and had restricted availability for filming for a while.

That’s what I think of Khan and the Eugenics wars.

I find many flaws in Akiva’s logic. He wants to preserve Roddenberry’s optimistic vision for the future, but doesn’t change the eventual occurrence of the Eugenics Wars, just the date in which they occur. He claims that since we have already moved past the 1990s in our real history, it was necessary to move the date. Yet, there are many aspects of recent Trek, including the Lake Ontario Bridge from this very episode, that are not part of our actual history. It is also unfathomable to me that this Khan, who lived 3 decades after he was supposed to (based on actual dialog from the episode) will have the same experience on the Botany Bay that will lead to him being found by Kirk in 2267. Heck, is he even the same genetic individual if he was born that many years from when he was “supposed” to have lived? Perhaps, but even if so, his life experiences are bound to be very different. Despite the attempt to downplay the significance of these creative choices, it seems like this has for sure created a new timeline within the Prime Universe that erases much of what we know about TOS and beyond. This isn’t being portrayed as a separate universe like the Kelvin universe. It truly changes the Prime Timeline, which seems hard to believe since the Deptartment of Temporal Investigations should have cared more about fixing it. But, I do think it goes a long way towards explaining all the inconsistencies in Discovery and SNW. I just wish it didn’t do it at the expense of almost 60 years of previously established canon. I am curious to see how this all plays out over time, and whether this series or a future series tries to reconcile everything into a single, coherent timeline. As some on this board have suggested, that might make for a great show!

I think his justification is back to front. It’s making things more cohesive with later depictions of 20th and 21st century Earth in universe than it is keeping things in line with the real world.

TOS has a lot of inconsistencies so it’s easier to ignore a lot of it than try and work it out (clocking in cards, no female captains, a chapel on a starship etc) just say hey it was the 60s and consider TOS patchwork canon.

Agreed with all of this!

As I said in my OP, I think this change is much bigger than knowing Khan was born 30 years later and could have a huge impact on ALL Trek canon going forward. Some will see it as a bad thing but others a good thing if it gives the show a way to avoid all the canon stuff in universe and not just trample over it like many felt it did in season one.

I do like SNW, but sadly like DIS before it, I’m just not sure if making more prequels are the answer if they can’t stick to basic canon and they know they have a very fickle fanbase. But maybe now they found a middle ground to make everyone happy and gives the freedom to do what they want without calling it a reboot or throwing the show 900 years into the future. We’ll see I guess.

I agree that they should stay away from prequels, but they just can’t seem to help themselves :-) In general I’m OK with them using established canon (the Temporal Cold War) to explain differences and give them the freedom to chart their own path forward. What bugs me is that for the Kelvin movies, Abrams & Company went out of their way to say that those films were in a separate universe and did not “erase” the Prime Universe. I’m not sure that can be said for the creative path they have taken with this revised timeline… This seems to erase/change the Prime Universe and is more difficult for me to digest. Perhaps there is a longer-term plan for how this is resolved – assuming these new shows continue long enough given the recent challenges. I actually do appreciate that TPTB are trying to provide in-universe explanations for some of the canon discrepancies. That shows that they care at least enough to appease those of us who appreciate better consistency among the shows.

Yeah…unfortunately. Sigh

I will admit, I was kind of hoping when SNW came around that maybe they would either just do a better job with the canon issues than DIS did or just wrote around it (ie, DON’T make the Gorn as your main villains and so on). Now, it’s still way better than Discovery, that’s not even a question. But it’s also obvious the same people who made that show is involved with this show. Yes, they learned some lessons, but unfortunately not enough.

OR maybe they have and as said this will make it an alternate timeline which I said I’m all for. But I understand to you and others it may feel like it’s ‘erasing’ TOS, I just don’t really see it that way personally. It’s all fiction and of course you can just tell yourself whatever you want. I see it just taking its own course away from what we seen in the prime timeline. Maybe that is trying to have my cake and eat it too, I admit that, but since TOS and the other shows are still available to buy or stream, then I can go with that and not think too much about it. ;)

But yeah I think it’s great to have an in-universe explanation and it does fit logically even if it’s not necessary. I just think this is a case that really didn’t need to change at all but whatever gets Goldsman more sleep in his mansion every night I guess.

I am very curious to see what it all means going forward. Not the Khan nonsense, I just can’t begin to care, but I mean the stories actually set in the 23rd century. ;)

Actually I was thinking about this today and your theory could be right. Because didn’t the Romulan say she went to 1992 to kill Khan but he wasn’t around until later?

Just stick with me now, but if history was already changed BEFORE she got there, so how would she remember it if the timeline was already changed?? Doesn’t that suggest she just came from the original timeline then? So there are two timelines now (at least). Maybe I’m just remembering it wrong but if true then maybe the Prime timeline doesn’t get erased and everything that happened in TOS was just like before.

So TOS stays in the original with the other old shows but SNW veers off into a new one thanks to TCW.

Works for me! 🙂👍

Exactly! How do you remember a timeline if it’s already been erased IN YOUR TIME? And something that already happened centuries ago now, regardless if she came from the 23rd century or the 27th since we have no idea when she came from. But since she said she didn’t recognize Kirk until later, she’s probably came from a later century than them.

Now I’m guessing the writers who wrote it probably wasn’t thinking that hard about it and just wanted to acknowledge that time has shifted and that was really the only way to do it. But Goldsman and everyone working on Trek today should know how fandom works and that every little word and line is scrutinized to the tenth power. I remember after the 09 movie came out and was on IMDB and there was a thread with hundreds of posts over Uhura’s ‘alternate reality’ line and did it mean alternate timeline or universe or both? Yeah we think about this stuff way more than we should lol.

But ironically the only other story I can remember where someone showed up in an already altered timeline and was unaware of the changes is Spock in the first Kelvin movie. So yeah, this is pointing in the exact same direction and it’s just two different timelines and nothing has actually been erased in the Prime timeline.

The only vision Roddenberry had was Dollar Signs. And there’s nothing wrong with that.

There are two very practical reasons why they needed to re-set the Khan timeline, and nothing has anything to do with canon or Gene Roddenberry’s vision of the future.

• People love Star Trek episodes/movies where our heroes come and visit “us” in our time. It connects us to them. 2023 is clearly AFTER the Eugenics Wars which (as told in the 1960’s) happened in the 1990’s. So any story set after the 1990’s would have to be in a reality that is VERY much not our world and our time.
• Further, one of the reason that time travel stories to “our time” are so popular with the writers and producers is they are cheaper to produce – no sets to build, no costumes (so to speak), etc. Setting any visit to “present day” in a world that is post-eugenics wars means that there’s no more production savings, because a whole post-apocalyptic world would have to be manufactured.

Personally, I have no problem with them resetting the dates. It only makes sense.

These are the same people who made Picard season 2 last year that traveled back to ‘our’ world in 2024 that had a scientist producing human clones, Sanctuary districts existing and apparently we now have the technology and capability to send people on manned flights to Jupiter. Someone mentioned the bridge that was seen in this episode is also just made up.

None of that exists in our world today but that didn’t stop them from including it anyway. And unlike the Eugenics War, they weren’t trying to predict a future decades away, this all takes place in modern times. So I don’t buy this idea that they are trying to mimic the ‘real’ present day even now when the same guy who is saying Star Trek, a show literally about the future, needs to keep up with the present times but still had no problem throwing a lot of sci fi goobly gook in what is suppose to be our reality. I don’t know how much more contradictory it can get.

And that’s fine because A. Star Trek is not our actual universe and B. it’s just a TV show.

It basically comes down to this: Akiva Goldsman is a writer first, showrunner second. As a writer with no prior interest in Star Trek and with no connection to anything that preceded his involvement, it has less to do with Gene Roddenberry’s optimistic view of the future and far more to do with the inconvenience of canon which may get in the way of telling a story.

With First Contact just 4 decades away, they can only push the goal posts so far.

Denny C, we really need to keep our facts straight and not promote inaccurate narratives here, however unintentionally.

Akiva Goldsman has been a fan since childhood.

– He watched the show as a young child in first run.

– He attended the first-ever con in NYC in the early 70s.

– He and a friend formed on of the first ever fanzine-like clubs.

Yes, he’s a writer before all, but he’s also a writer who’s really sensitive to what Roddenberry’s vision was and was paying attention to what Roddenberry himself said in the 70s because he was at those cons.

Now on the timeline solution:

Yes, there are excellent reasons to do this from a writer’s perspective, but what they’ve done is what makes sense from a physicist’s point of view. In fact it’s about the only explanation that fits with modern physics.

In fact, what makes no scientific sense whatsoever is the idea that all the various temporal shenanigans throughout the history of the franchise has not altered the Prime Universe continuity.

Check out the comments of Trek writers who understand physics like Christopher L Bennet (author of the DTI books) who comments on TOR and on the Trek BBS. For him, the temporal physics referenced in this episode are obviously the only ones that work. He’s pleased that it’s finally articulated in onscreen canon.

With this in-universe confirmation that the Prime Universe timeline is adjusting and pushing back against incursions, First Contact need not take place 40 years from now, just like humanity didn’t achieve Warp in the 1990s as originally stated in TOS.

My bad. That should have read involvement, not interest.

My point, ultimately, is that he wasn’t involved with TOS or any production from the Berman era and not being married to that legacy means he can simply ignore it.

As for First Contact not taking place 40 years from now and with SNW as part of the timeline and Picard and company already having witnessed First Contact, it would appear to be a fixed point. For all we know the timeline was impacted by Kirk and crew when they returned from 1986 with the whales (and primarily because Scotty provided the formula for transparent aluminum years earlier than we should have had it?).

But, in the end, it’s still comes down to a showrunner wanting to tell stories in their own way and having worked with a number of them over the years, there’s the story they tell in interviews about why they did something, and the actual conversations happening behind the scenes. I think for Akiva Goldsman, SNW is where he finally hit his stride with Star Trek and he’s making it his own.

All this talk of “Roddenberry’s Vision” makes me chuckle because said vision was TNG Season 1… and isn’t that derided as being one of the work Trek seasons ever made?

Wasn’t it really TMP first before TNG? That movie seriously put me to sleep. 🥱

I didn’t start watching Trek until after Roddenberry died and not really a TOS fan. TNG is my favorite show but after Michael Piller took it over in third season.

So never cared about Roddenberry’s vision. And he started to sound like a nutty zealot over it…although now I’m understanding why some people treat this show like a religion and not just a TV show.

No, it doesn’t make a lick of sense and it doesn’t matter what any physicist says or thinks. The bottom line is Trek history is a fictional history. That fictional history is under no obligation to match our reality. A Trek prediction that does not come to pass in reality doesn’t invalidate Trek or make it less inspirational or any other such hogwash.

What makes most sense is AG & Co screwed up so badly with their foolish comments about how “in sync” with canon they are that they felt they needed something like this to make their show work better. And as usual, they really didn’t think it through because what they succeeded at doing was admit without admitting it that their show was a reboot. Or a new & independent time line. Which is essentially a reboot without wanting to call it a reboot.

“As a writer with no prior interest in Star Trek”

NOT TRUE — NO WAY — SERIOUSLY?

Akiva has been a Star Trek fan his ENTIRE LIFE since childhood? And he’s been involved in Trek fandom since being a teenager? THESE ARE INCONTROVERTIBLE FACTS!

You know, I have no issue with fans being critical of this man’s creative decisions, and I can understand some passionate blowback as well, but I have to draw the line and defend the dude when false accusations are made against him — that’s just wrong and dishonorable!

I clarified above.

OK, thanks, but that clarification severely weakens your overall point. If what you had said had been true, then your original point would have been much more convincing.

Now, its basically that we have a life long Trek fan, who went to some of the original Trek conventions in the 1970’s, and even started his own fan group, but he didn’t work in Trek before Kurtzman…like, so what? That’s just not all that compelling without the falsehood that he never had been interested in Trek his entire life before that to back up your point.

So your Jango constructed tower doesn’t hold up when that falsehood wood block at the bottom that is propping the tower up up is removed — the Jango tower falls.

Look… I’m a born and bred Star Trek nerd-fan. (Maybe not as hardcore as some of you, but compared to 99.999% of the world, I’m a Star Trek nut job.) I get that the logic of all of this is sometimes not there. I get that it’s easy to get caught up in all of that. But (you knew that was coming), the vast majority of fans don’t care that much. They want to be entertained and caught up in the spirit of what Star Trek is about. Optimism. Adventure. Exploration of the unknown. Crews that feel like family. And, of course, rad ships and amazing future-tech. The average viewer is not at all confused about why TOS looks like something shot in someone’s garage compared to SNW even though SNW comes first in the timeline. Not only are they not confused, it also don’t bother them in the slightest. My wife is a fan by marriage and of all the things she asks about that are confusing for her, the things brought up here are not even on the list. She can just enjoy it.

So, no… they don’t need to, nor will they, reboot Star Trek. Are there inconsistencies? All over the place. But there always have been. Always. Some of them will be ignored. Others will be “explained” (a la Klingon ridges or the lack of spore drives after the TOS era), but by and large, the history is consistent. (I’m sure if Roddenberry and the producers of TOS had ever thought they were launching a new universe and that every plot point would have to be revered in the future, they would have put some more care into defining it.)

But, here’s the thing (and then I’m done, I promise)… I’m not even saying that you’re wrong for tearing it apart or getting caught up in all of it. What I’m saying is, by doing so, you’re just getting in the way of enjoying something that the majority of viewers are able to enjoy and go along for a very fun ride. Your choice… but as someone who used to be on your side of the fence, the grass is definitely greener over here.

Dude, that was just so well said! I love your broader perspective even though I also enjoy evaluating how the sausage gets made.

Except they have rebooted Trek already. The 3 Kelvin movies were reboots. And a very strong case can be made to say that all the nu-Trek is a reboot.

I would argue that they tried to reboot Star Trek. At the time, the intention was that it would be a reset for Star Trek altogether and they could let old Trek die. It didn’t work. (Obviously, because we’re here.) So much so, that now we’re back in the Prime Universe (not asking for a debate on that) and that’s just an alternate reality we may or may not visit again. And, sure… a strong case could be made that “nu-Trek” is a reboot. Which is exactly my whole point. You can choose to sit here getting lost in the weeds of debate over ever nuanced detail (totally an acceptable choice), or you can accept that sometimes it doesn’t all perfectly line up and just enjoy the ride of a well-made and very entertaining show. (BTW… if you put this much scrutiny on “old-Trek,” you’d never make it past TOS without throwing your hands in the air.)

I don’t think that was the intention. To let old Trek die. I think they just felt they wanted a movie reboot. That’s all. There was nothing preventing a continuation with the prime for another feature or TV show.

I am getting the “let’s overwrite old Trek and let it die” vibe from the people making Trek now, though. More than that… By using their timey-whimey gobletygook it turns their alternative reality vision of Trek into the prime version. At least to them.

“ Because otherwise, it’s silly, or Star Trek ceases to be in our universe ” Trek is not OUR future. That is obvious when in STP there is a manned Europa mission in 2024. Goldsman doesn’t get it. It is an “alternate” timeline from an in-show standpoint.

Sorry, but that is just dead wrong!

GR set this up as a construct that would present a generally possible science fiction future for mankind. You don’t have to agree with that, but that’s a cornerstone of the franchise that doesn’t get changed, ever.

This ain’t the Marvel Multiverse or For All Mankind. This has always been built with the general theme of being a science fiction theoretically possible future set-up. We can of course nitpick, list exception eps, and point out many flaws, but GR’s approach is the construct the franchise must follow — like it or not, the main crew and events in most of the eps are fictionalized to take place in our future, NOT an alternate timeline.

We don’t get to change this, and neither does Akiva, Henry or Alex. They are doing the correct thing in making minor updates, and some fans just need to chill out (or maybe go see The Flash this week with the 15 batmans if that’s the sort of approach you prefer…lol).

And if CBS ever says this an alternate, multiverse timeline, then that is the day I stop watching Star Trek.

Goldsman knows a encyclopedic definition of what Star Trek is, but he doesn’t get what makes Star Trek great.

“Trek is not OUR future.”

I been saying this for about 20 years now. At some point it was, but that stopped being the case a long time ago once our real time caught up to Trek’s fake history; unless you think in the next 40 years we’re going to have a nuclear war, invent warp travel and make first contact with Vulcans. C’mon people lol.

There are more things in TOS that indicate it’s not actually supposed to be our future than I remember (thanks, Christopher L. Bennett.)

I actually pointed this out in another post myself like the fact they already had a manned mission to Saturn by the early 21st century. (Tomorrow is Yesterday)

Another reason why this is pretty pointless.

Yep. I think most people understand the difference between a fictional history and reality. I guess AG underestimates the fans. Or, he’s just trying to cover up his screw ups because he is incapable of admitting he made a huge mistake.

Well said bro! 👍

He wants the show to feel like our own world but then make the Europa mission just shows what a true hypocritical hack he is. 🙄

We want Star Trek to be an aspirational future.

It wasn’t already?

Also Pike’s line in SNW S1E1 ignored certain geopolitical realities.

I’m guessing what he meant by that was that after the three dark, depressing seasons of Picard, and the juvenile and cynical antics of three seasons on LDS, they wanted to get Trek back to this aspirational future that those two series were severely lacking on?

Exactly, Mike.

LMAO. This is nothing but another load of BS on his part with help from you to excuse a badly done and unoriginal episode. And calling it a correction of Gene’s vision is pure arrogance.

Blaming Anthony Pascale at Trekmovie, falsely claiming this was not GR’s intention for his vision, and whining like a middle-schooler that this is all BS…well, in baseball we know that: 3 strikes and you’re out!

This may be the most moronic and just flat out nuts post I have seen in 2023 so far.

I like the episode and the concept, but yeah definitely badly done. And I was very excited about this one.

True. This is indeed an obvious load of BS from AG. And in doing what he did is indeed the height of arrogance. Although I wouldn’t blame the article author. He’s just reporting what this sorry excuse for a producer said.

The potential for creating a new time line is to great to believe time travel would be allowed by any sentient species. Every single atom of our time line must function as it is designed in order to get the results. One changed thing even so minor as a dead fly could alter or create a new time line.

I honestly believe that the showrunners of Enterprise purposely created the temporal Cold war to justify the changes they wanted to make prior to the original series. There was an interesting line from Discovery season 2 where Michael Burnham’s mother says that time travel basically enhances technology.

I thought at the time that was the showrunners acknowledging that the optical changes to the prime universe were a result of time travel. I don’t understand why fans are having such a hard time just accepting this it makes sense.

There are plenty of instances throughout Trek Cannon to justify a soft reboot of the entire franchise and I don’t see anything wrong with that. Comic book writers do it all the time. Star Trek first contact in the Enterprise episode regeneration are prime examples of that. No pun intended.

I think the crossover with lower decks is going to delve more into this. I’m enjoying great Star Trek content. I don’t mind the reboot of the original series.

There are many instances where the original series does not hold up in our modern world. Scotty using words like Oriental. Khan being painted. Klingons in black face not to mention the way women were treated on the show like weak props. Did you guys forget about mudds women ?

I love the original series but you’re being intellectually dishonest if you didn’t see this coming. Once they rebooted the original series in the movies and created a distinct universe I knew that the original series would have to be retooled. I love it but there are parts of it that don’t hold up. Abraham Lincoln called Uhura a charming “Negress”…. The list goes on sure it’s a reflection of 1960s culture and speculative fiction of what the future might be. I get that. No franchises immune to tweaks and retcons. Star wars does it all the time.

I love the original series but you’re being intellectually dishonest if you didn’t see this coming. Once they rebooted the original series in the movies and created a distinct universe I knew that the original series would have to be retooled. I love it but there are parts of it that don’t hold up. Abraham Lincoln called Uhura a charming “Negress”…. The list goes on sure it’s a reflection of 1960s culture and speculative fiction of what the future might be. I get that. No franchises immune to tweaks and retcons. 

EXACTLY !!!!! THANK YOU !!!!!

The producers of SNW have said this is in “the Prime Universe,” so it’s the both sides of their mouth speech from the series conception that has made it a problem for some people. Not everyone is as enlightened as you or UD-NN and knew this would be a reboot from the jump. Absolutely nobody forced them to make a prequel to The Original Series. That was their choice. There’s baggage attached to that they opted to take on — this is the internet so you tone policing complaints is par for the course, but blowhard producers body englishing their way into something beloved to do their own “take” on it shouldn’t get a free pass.

That Lincoln example is a weird example of how Trek doesn’t hold up. If the fantasy is that Lincoln talks to 23rd century characters, then it makes sense. If you’re just saying that certain behaviors or words in TOS conflict with modern sensibilities, then I get it but that doesn’t mean it’s the best argument that old = bad, new = good.

All that said, I think using the stupid Temporal Cold War concept is a fantastic way for everybody — fan, bored producer, studio that never liked the property that made them billions alike — to get what they want. It all happened, and you can pick which version of history you prefer.

So um which part are you opposed to. Lincoln speaking like he’s from 1850? A 1960s show having Lincoln speak like he’s from 1850? 2260s Uhura not being outraged and not trying to cancel him???

You do realize he’s not really supposed to be the actual Abraham Lincoln right? . They did not bring him back from the past through time travel. He’s an artificial construct that the aliens created. Hence, he knows about Vulcan philosophy and can easily interact with 23rd century humans. So the whole “negress” thing is silly, unnecessary, offensive and dated.

Man, about half of these criticisms I see about strange new worlds are from fans who really don’t know the original series eps all that well or haven’t watched an episode in years, but still think they know what happened in the eps…lol

Know your Star Trek!

Nothing you said answers the question. (And it is ridiculous that you think everyone doesn’t realize it’s a simulation Lincoln – so why are you concerned about a simulation – maybe you should revisit Uhura’s retort.)

It’s an obvious extension of what I already said — if they are going to make a simulated Lincoln that could already talk in 23rd century lingo as well as know Vulcans and Vulcan philosophy, then of course the simulation wouldn’t suddenly call and African American woman a negress…that’s laughable. As further proof, he didn’t say anything to Sulu or Chekov that illustrated dated racial terms.

Dude, it’s not the real Abraham Lincoln brought forward in time. It’s an artificial Lincoln construct that is designed to communicate with 23rd Century Federation crew, including aliens event.

I liked your post. Thanks. Gave me a chuckle. And it makes a ton of sense, too.

It’s a show from the 60s. Lors of shows from that time are out of date. I don’t understand how another show is changing that? People will still just watch TOS anyway so I don’t get this logic at all.

It’s just a TV show it’s not real life. I think sone Trekkies forget this little detail.

I pointed this out too. It doesn’t stop people from watching TOS lol. So I don’t even understand this argument???? All SNW is doing is just creating an alternate timeline to solve it’s own canon issues basically, which is fine. But it doesn’t just erase another show either lol. Again, people think waaaaay too hard about this stuff. If you decide to watch Space Seed or TWOK, nothing changes at all. You’re just assuming everyone is going to watch SNW or accept it as the priority. Not everyone will or even have to.

But if you feel that strongly about it, then just purge that show out of the timeline completely and don’t show it at all. Then watch the uproar over it. ;)

If they said TOS was no longer canon or something then that would at least makes sense. But no one would ever dare do that so nothing changed. Everything is still there, sexism and all.

Exactly. But no one is saying that obviously.

“I love the original series but you’re being intellectually dishonest if you didn’t see this coming. Once they rebooted the original series in the movies and created a distinct universe I knew that the original series would have to be retooled. I love it but there are parts of it that don’t hold up. Abraham Lincoln called Uhura a charming “Negress”…. The list goes on sure it’s a reflection of 1960s culture and speculative fiction of what the future might be. I get that. No franchises immune to tweaks and retcons. Star wars does it all the time.”

No one is being ‘intellectually dishonest’ We just don’t see the need it has to be retooled because it’s a TV SHOW, not a law. Everyone understands watching it today it wasn’t made in 2023, it was made in 1966 and people still watch it just the same, right?

It happened 30 years ago already. Who is no longer watching Star Trek because of it?

But if you truly feel this way then reboot it and start over ! Instead of constant retcons and just muddying up 55 year old canon, maybe just ignore it completely and just start anew. You mention comic book writers retooling things, but they also do entire redesigns of those characters and story lines to keep the stories fresh but also to update it for modern times. SNW is not ‘modernizing’ TOS, it’s only retconing some of its canon. TOS is still there.

If you want to modernize TOS, then you have to do what the Kelvin movies did and just wipe the slate clean and retell that show.

And this isn’t aimed at you, but I really want to knock my head against a wall with these discussions because A. Most people don’t seem to even want a prequel in the first place, but yes SNW is definitely an exception B. Most people are far more interested in building new mythology and stories and not just retelling old ones. And that’s because C. We don’t have to continue to get in inane and tedious arguments such as these in the first place.

All that said, now that’s it done, can we MOVE ON to actual new stories and not ones based on 300 years in the past?

That’s what I wish (and had been hoping) the Kelvin movies were in the first place.

It really should’ve been. But ironically it’s probably why they seem so reluctant to reboot it today because of how divided fans became over those movies and being in another universe.

But instead, let’s keep outdated and archaic canon held over from the 60s so we can keep having tedious and tireless debates like this one. Makes total sense.

The TCW appeared on Enterprise ONLY because the UPN execs wanted some kind of futuristic element on the show. They were not completely on board with going to 100 years before Kirk. The creators didn’t want to do any of that at all. So they adapted an idea for a completely separate TV show one had come up with and altered it to fit with the Enterprise setting. They weren’t big on it and there weren’t many episodes that dealt with it as a result. So you are dead wrong there.

Also, TOS wasn’t “rebooted” for the features at all. Not sure where you got that from. Altering the Klingon look doesn’t mean it’s a reboot. Changing the uniforms doesn’t mean it’s a reboot. Giving the Enterprise a refit doesn’t mean it’s a reboot. In fact absolutely nothing about the TOS features even suggests reboot.

I guess maybe they mean a visual reboot? That’s certainly true at least.

In the sense that in reality 15 years later new car models come out, fashions change, new architecture appears… That’s not a “visual reboot”. That’s called the passage of time.

This was subtle, but it turns out we have the Canadians to blame for the Eugenics War.

The solution to all this is very simple: just take the original episode Space Seed and dub in the word “2023” in place of “1992” — problem solved! Repeat in TWOK and anywhere else you need to. Ten seconds of overdubs = no more conflicts!

LOL! Someone should’ve suggested this to Goldsman. ;)

World War III

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World War III was a global, and ultimately nuclear, conflict on Earth in the mid- 21st century . Over 600 million people died in the war, and human civilization nearly collapsed, resulting in a period known as "the post-atomic horror " that lasted into the early 22nd century . ( TNG : " Encounter at Farpoint ", Star Trek: First Contact )

• 2 Aftermath, first contact, and the legacy of WW3
• 3.1 Dragon Ball Z vs. Star Trek: The Way of Infinity
• 3.2 Federation Spaceflight Chronology
• 3.3 Missing Link
• 3.4 Star Trek: 001
• 3.5 Star Trek: The Adventures of Argus
• 5 External links

History [ ]

The flag of Colonel Green and the Optimum Movement.

Historians of later centuries had varying opinions on the exact nature of the war and its origins. Some linked it to the Eugenics Wars of the late 20th century , and while the seeds of the conflict may have been planted then, most scholars agreed it really began with Colonel Phillip Green 's ecoterrorism in 2026 which resulted in 37 million deaths. Green and his troops executed hundreds of thousands of people with "impurities" like radiation sickness , claiming that their deaths were for the good of future generations. ( TOS : " Space Seed ", " The Savage Curtain ", VOY : " In the Flesh ", ENT : " In a Mirror Darkly, Part II ", " Demons ", " Terra Prime ")

Among other parties in the conflict were the Eastern Coalition ("ECON"), which fought against the United States of America and the European Union . Various factions, including Green's cadre and possibly the ECON, used drugs to control their military. ( Star Trek: First Contact , TNG : " Encounter at Farpoint ", TNG novel: Federation )

Even during this period of global turmoil, the New United Nations worked for peace, and in 2036 declared that "no human being would be held accountable for the crimes of their race or forebearers". However, the group's efforts met with failure. ( TNG : " Encounter at Farpoint ")

The Mind Control Revolts of 2043 - 47 occurred during this period. ( TOS novel: Star Trek: The Motion Picture )

Sometime before the war's peak, parts of New York City were mostly abandoned and was invaded by a faction of the Eastern Coalition. ( Star Trek: 001 : "When It Rains..." )

World War III reached its peak on 1 May 2053 , when nuclear weapons were detonated over London , New York City, Tel Aviv , Jerusalem , Mecca , Beijing and other cities. Asia was hit hardest, followed by the United States. Nearly half a billion people died in the initial blasts; Washington, DC and the surrounding three states were "blown off the map", and Earth was plunged into a nuclear winter that lasted most of the next decade. The post-atomic horror that followed severely destabilized civilization all over the world as governments fell and terrorist groups and rogue states detonated "suitcase nukes" and released biological weapons . The drug-controlled troops were used as cannon fodder in conventional ground battles after many global computer systems were sabotaged. Numerous small-scale conflicts erupted across the globe. The economy of the United States was devastated, and most of its citizens were reduced to living conditions worse than the Great Depression of the 1930s . ( Star Trek: First Contact ; The Lost Era novel: The Sundered )

For two months following the "outbreak" of World War III, Caesar's Palace in Las Vegas served as the operational command center for Colonel Amber's Regimental Volunteers and was the site of the final battle of the Siege of Las Vegas. ( DS9 novel: The Lives of Dax : "Second Star to the Right...")

When the extent of the devastation became clear, the remaining governments gathered in San Francisco to sign a peace accord. Even so, some wished to keep fighting, like Colonel Green and others of his ilk. After Green's death, one of his lieutenants, Colonel Adrik Thorsen , continued terrorist strikes in the name of the Optimum Movement , and by the 2070s , gained control of Great Britain . ( ENT : " Demons "; TNG novel: Federation )

Aftermath, first contact, and the legacy of WW3 [ ]

First Contact with the Vulcans in 2063 inspired new hope in humanity and aided in recovery from the war's effects in some areas. Nonetheless, the post-atomic horror raged on in Asia, the Middle East, and the "new third world" sunk into total lawlessness. According to Jean-Luc Picard , these areas remained in "chaos" well into the early 22nd century . ( TNG : " Encounter at Farpoint ", " Up the Long Ladder ")

Gradually, as the post-atomic horror declined, new attempts at unified global alliances sprung up, including the European Hegemony c. 2123 . These alliances eventually formed the genesis of the United Earth in 2150 . ( TNG : " Up the Long Ladder ", " Attached ")

World War III's legacy was far-reaching, and continued to be felt a hundred years later. The war eventually became a popular subject in the recovered film industry. The philosophy of Neo-Transcendentalism was founded to advocate a return to a "simpler life" in response to the devastation advanced technology had brought humanity. Other less-benign schools of thought emerged, including the xenophobia exemplified by the Back-to-Earth movement and its more aggressive "cousin" Terra Prime , an outgrowth of Green and Thorsen's "Optimum Philosophy". ( ENT : " Home ", " Demons ", " Terra Prime ", TNG : " Up the Long Ladder "; Star Trek novels: Final Frontier , novel )

Ultimately, World War III and first contact marked a turning point for humanity. In the aftermath, humanity came together, putting aside the differences of race and culture, and unified in a way never before seen. ( Star Trek: First Contact )

Dragon Ball Z vs. Star Trek: The Way of Infinity [ ]

During World War III, Kyoto was destroyed by three hydrogen bombs . After World War III, it was rebuilt.

The Vulcans were able to remove most radioactive material in Earth's atmosphere, but small, harmless amounts of radioactive particles remained in the atmosphere. In many big cities on earth, devices were installed to remove as much of their particles as possible. These devices were still in use during the 24th century .

Federation Spaceflight Chronology [ ]

In this continuity, World War III took place from 2026 to 2047 , ending with the Day of Fire , in which 600 million beings on Earth died within 20 minutes. ( Federation Spaceflight Chronology , vol. 3)

Missing Link [ ]

In this continuity, neither the Optimum Movement nor the Eastern Coalition was involved -- in fact, neither political entity is mentioned. Economic upheavals in 2008 and 2013 are referred to, as is climatic change resulting in the average sea level rising by as much as two feet. A conflict of over 25 years ended with the near destruction of the United States of America , Russia and China by each other's nuclear weapons in August of 2053. San Francisco was one of the cities destroyed in a nuclear strike.

Star Trek: 001 [ ]

In 2752 , the crew of Starbase 001 became trapped within a holographic simulation of World War III, where they were forced to protect themselves from the holographic invading forces of the Eastern Coalition. One of the Coalition's strategies was to invade an abandoned city so that they would attain much of what was left, including possible technologies, intact. A corrupted Starfleet Command had claimed the simulation was intended as a time travel test for the crew, but in reality, was a plot to kill off those who would oppose them. ( Star Trek: 001 : "When It Rains..." )

Star Trek: The Adventures of Argus [ ]

In 2026 the Optimum Movement detonated a series of nuclear devices in 25 major cities of the United States of America , killing 30 million people and fracturing the country. In retaliation, what was left of the US government launched their own missiles at those they thought were responsible, killing a further 7 million and igniting the conflict.

Following the opening attacks there was a six-month lull, during which the eastern states America had attacked unified into the Eastern Coalition Of Nations . A quarter of a century's worth of tension between eastern and western nations and hatred of the US and its allies fueled the ECON with a seemingly unending supply of troops that allowed them to initially steamroller their way forwards. With their most powerful member crippled and facing overwhelming numbers, the western nations, under the organisational banner of the North Atlantic Treaty Organisation , used small tactical nuclear strikes to slow the advance.

The virtual stalemate continued for several years, draining resources on both sides and causing unrest to grow in the western nations, which the Optimum Movement used to promote their philosophy of survival of the fittest. By 2033 the USA had been reformed under the Optimum, with Great Britain, United Ireland, Spain, Germany and Italy joining it by 2047 and all withdrew from the New United Nations , effectively disbanding the organisation for a second time.

In 2053 the Optimum finally put its philosophy to the test, launching a massive nuclear strike on the ECON to end the war. Unfortunately for them, the ECON managed to launch a counter strike and the result was the effective crippling of either side's ability to make war and leading the signing of the San Francisco cease-fire, but the cost was high. Almost every major city on earth had been destroyed and 300,000,000 people killed, a death toll that doubled that of the entire conflict up to that point and that made the attack that had begun the war pale in comparison.

Despite the signing of the cease-fire, small conflicts continued to erupt over the next two decades as the Optimum and ECON governments continued to collapse, with the final Optimum stronghold, Great Britain, falling in 2079 . (" Nuclear Time ")

See also [ ]

• Optimum Conflict

External links [ ]

• World War III article at Memory Alpha , the canon Star Trek wiki.
• World War III article at Memory Beta , the non-canon Star Trek wiki.
• 1 Daniels (Agent)
• 3 USS Enterprise (NCC-1701-H) (Endurance class)

World War III

• View history

World War III (aka the Third World War or Third Great War ) was a devastating war in the 21st century of Earth 's history.

History [ ]

Factions [ ].

• Western Alliance
• Eastern Coalition
• Islamic Caliphate
• Pretoria Pact

External Links [ ]

• World War III article at Memory Alpha , the canon Star Trek wiki.
• World War III article at Memory Beta , the non-canon Star Trek wiki.
• World War III article at Star Trek Expanded Universe .

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55 Years Ago: Star Trek Final Episode Airs, Relationship with NASA Endures

Johnson space center.

The voyages of the Starship Enterprise came to a sudden and premature end on June 3, 1969, with the airing of the final episode of the Star Trek original television series. Ironically, the show’s cancellation came just six weeks before humanity embarked on its first voyage to land on another celestial body. Although the show ran for only three seasons, it generated a devoted fan base disappointed by the cancellation despite their write-in campaign to keep it on the air. But as things turned out, over the decades Star Trek evolved into a global phenomenon, first with the original episodes replayed in syndication, followed by a series of full-length motion pictures, and eventually a multitude of spin-off series. With its primary focus on space exploration, along with themes of diversity, inclusion, and innovation, the Star Trek fictional universe formed a natural association with NASA’s real life activities.

Star Trek creator Gene Roddenberry first had the idea for a science fiction television series in 1964. He presented his idea, a show set in the 23 rd century aboard a starship with a crew dedicated to exploring the galaxy, to Desilu Productions, an independent television production company headed by Lucille Ball. They produced a pilot titled “The Cage,” selling it to the National Broadcasting Corporation (NBC) network that then bought a second pilot titled “Where No Man Has Gone Before.” NBC introduced the show to its fall 1966 lineup, with the first episode “The Man Trap” airing on Sep. 8. To put that date in perspective, NASA launched Gemini XI four days later, one of the missions that helped the agency achieve the Moon landing nearly three years later. Meanwhile, Star Trek’s Starship Enterprise continued its fictional five-year mission through the galaxy to “seek out new life and new civilizations.” The makeup of the Enterprise’s crew made the show particularly attractive to late 1960s television audiences. The major characters included an African American woman communications officer, an Asian American helmsman, and a half-human half-Vulcan science officer, later joined by a Russian-born ensign. While the show enjoyed good ratings during its first two seasons, cuts to its production budget resulted in lower quality episodes during its third season leading to lower ratings and, despite a concerted letter-writing campaign from its dedicated fans, eventual cancellation.

Despite the show’s cancellation, Star Trek lived on and prospered in syndication and attracted an ever-growing fan base, turning into a worldwide sensation. Often dubbed “trekkies,” these fans held the first of many Star Trek conventions in 1972. When in 1976 NASA announced that it would name its first space shuttle orbiter Constitution, in honor of its unveiling on the anniversary of the U. S. Constitution’s ratification, trekkies engaged in a dedicated letter writing campaign to have the orbiter named Enterprise, after the starship in the television series. This time the fans’ letter writing campaign succeeded. President Gerald R. Ford agreed with the trekkies and directed NASA to rechristen the first space shuttle. When on Sept. 17, 1976 , it rolled out of its manufacturing plant in Palmdale, California, appropriately accompanied by a band playing the show’s theme song, it bore the name Enterprise. Many of the original cast members of the show as well as its creator Rodenberry participated in the rollout ceremony, hosted by NASA Administrator James C. Fletcher . Thus began a lengthy relationship between the space agency and the Star Trek brand.

During the development of the space shuttle in the 1970s, the need arose to recruit a new group of astronauts to fly the vehicle, deploy the satellites, and perform the science experiments. When NASA released the call for the new astronaut selection on July 8, 1976, it specifically encouraged women and minorities to apply. To encourage those applicants, NASA chose Nichelle Nichols, who played communications officer Lt. Uhura on the Starship Enterprise, to record a recruiting video and speak to audiences nationwide. She came to NASA’s Johnson Space Center (JSC) in Houston in March 1977, and accompanied by Apollo 12 and Skylab 3 astronaut Alan L. Bean , toured the center and filmed scenes for the video in Mission Control and other facilities. NASA hoped that her stature and popularity would encourage women and minorities to apply, and indeed they did. In January 1978, when NASA announced the selection of 35 new astronauts from more than 8,000 applicants, for the first time the astronaut class included women and minorities. All distinguished themselves as NASA astronauts and paved the way for others in subsequent astronaut selections. Nichols returned to JSC in September 2010 with the Traveling Space Museum, an organization that partners with schools to promote space studies. She toured Mission Control and the International Space Station trainer accompanied by NASA astronaut B. Alvin Drew . She also flew aboard NASA’s Stratospheric Observatory for Infrared Astronomy (SOFIA) airborne telescope aircraft managed by NASA’s Ames Research Center in Silicon Valley, California, in September 2015.

Meanwhile, the Star Trek brand renewed itself in 1979 as a full-length motion picture with the original TV series cast members reprising their roles. Over the years, several sequels followed this first film. And on the small screen, a reboot of sorts occurred in 1987 with the premiere of Star Trek: The Next Generation, a new series set in the 24 th century aboard the Enterprise-D, a next generation starship with a new crew. That series lasted seven seasons, followed by a near-bewildering array of spin-off series, all built on the Star Trek brand, that continue to this day.

James Doohan, the actor who played Lt. Cmdr. Montgomery “Scotty” Scott, the Starship Enterprise’s chief engineer, had early associations with NASA. In April 1967, Doohan visited NASA’s Dryden (now Armstrong) Flight Research Center in California, spending time with NASA test pilot Bruce A. Peterson. A month later, Peterson barely survived a horrific crash of the experimental M2-F2 lifting body aircraft. He inspired the 1970s TV series The Six-Million Dollar Man, and the show’s opening credits include film of the crash. Doohan narrated a documentary film about the space shuttle released shortly before Columbia made its first flight in April 1981. In January 1991, Doohan visited JSC and with NASA astronaut Mario Runco (who sometimes went by the nickname “Spock”) toured the shuttle trainers, Mission Control, and tried his hand at operating the shuttle’s robotic arm in the Manipulator Development Facility. In a unique tribute, astronaut Neil A. Armstrong , the first person to step on the lunar surface , spoke at Doohan’s retirement in 2004, addressing him as “one old engineer to another.”

George Takei, who played Enterprise helmsman Lt. Hikaru Sulu, and his husband Brad, visited JSC in May 2012. Invited by both Asian American and LGBTQ+ Employee Resource Groups, Takei spoke of leadership and inclusiveness, including overcoming challenges while in Japanese American internment camps during World War II and as a member of the LGBTQ+ community. He noted that Star Trek remained ahead of its time in creating a future when all members of society could equally participate in great undertakings, at a time when the country struggled through the Civil Rights movement and the conflict in Southeast Asia. The inclusiveness that is part of NASA’s culture greatly inspired him. JSC Director Michael L. Coats presented Takei with a plaque including a U.S. flag flown aboard space shuttle Atlantis’ STS-135 mission. He also visited Mission Control and spent some time with Robonaut.

Leonard Nimoy played the science officer aboard the Starship Enterprise, the half-human, half-Vulcan Mr. Spock. The actor watched in September 2012 when space shuttle Enterprise arrived at John F. Kennedy International Airport in New York, on the last leg of its journey to the Intrepid Sea, Air and Space Museum, where it currently resides. “This is a reunion for me,” observed Nimoy. “Thirty-five years ago, I met the Enterprise for the first time.” As noted earlier, the Star Trek cast attended the first space shuttle’s rollout in 1976. Following his death in 2015, European Space Agency astronaut Samantha Cristoforetti paid tribute to Nimoy aboard the International Space Station by wearing a Star Trek science officer uniform, giving the Vulcan greeting, and proclaiming, “Of all the souls I have encountered … his was the most human.”

Captain James T. Kirk, played by actor William Shatner, a life-long advocate of science and space exploration, served at the helm of the Starship Enterprise. His relationship with NASA began during the original series, with references to the space agency incorporated into several story lines. In 2011, Shatner hosted and narrated a NASA documentary celebrating the 30 th anniversary of the Space Shuttle program , and gave his time and voice to other NASA documentaries. NASA recognized Shatner’s contributions in 2014 with a Distinguished Public Service Medal , the highest award NASA bestows on non-government individuals. NASA Deputy Associate Administrator for Communications Robert “Bob” N. Jacobs presented the medal to Shatner. The award’s citation read, “For outstanding generosity and dedication to inspiring new generations of explorers around the world, and for unwavering support for NASA and its missions of discovery.” In 2019, Shatner narrated the NASA video We Are Going , about NASA’s plans to return astronauts to the Moon. He has spoken at numerous NASA-themed events and moderated panels about NASA’s future plans. On Oct. 13, 2021, at the age of 90, Shatner reached the edge of space during the NS-18 suborbital flight of Blue Origin’s New Shepard vehicle, experiencing three minutes of weightlessness.

Elements of the Star Trek universe have made their way not only into popular culture but also into NASA culture. As noted above, Star Trek fans had a hand in naming the first space shuttle Enterprise. NASA’s Earth observation facility aboard the space station that makes use of its optical quality window bears the name the Window Observational Research Facility (WORF). The connection between that acronym and the name of a Klingon officer aboard the Enterprise in the Star Trek: The Next Generation TV series seemed like an opportunity not to be missed – the facility’s official patch bears its name in English and in Klingon. Several astronaut crews have embraced Star Trek themes for their unofficial photographs. The STS-54 crew dressed in the uniforms of Starship Enterprise officers from Star Trek II: The Wrath of Kahn, the second full-length feature motion picture of the series. Space shuttle and space station crews created Space Flight Awareness (SFA) posters for their missions, and more than one embraced Star Trek themes. The Expedition 21 crew dressed in uniforms from the original series, while the STS-134 crew chose as their motif the 2009 reboot motion picture Star Trek.

As much as Star Trek has influenced NASA, in turn the agency has left its mark on the franchise, from episodes referencing actual and future spaceflight events to NASA astronauts making cameo appearances on the show. The first-season episode “Court Martial” that aired in February 1967 featured a photograph of the December 1965 Gemini VI launch adorning a wall aboard a star base. In the second-season episode “Return to Tomorrow,” airing in February 1968, Captain Kirk in a dialogue about risk-taking remarks, “Do you wish that the first Apollo mission hadn’t reached the Moon?” a prescient reference to the first Apollo mission to reach the Moon more than 10 months after the episode aired. Astronaut Mae C. Jemison , who credits Nichelle Nichols as her inspiration to become an astronaut, appeared in the 1993 episode “Second Chances” of Star Trek: The Next Generation , eight months after her actual spaceflight aboard space shuttle Endeavour. In May 2005, two other NASA astronauts, Terry W. Virts and E. Michael Fincke , appeared in “These are the Voyages…,” the final episode of the series Star Trek: Enterprise.

In the 2016 documentary “ NASA on the Edge of Forever: Science in Space ,” host NASA astronaut Victor J. Glover states, “Science and Star Trek go hand-in-hand.” The film explores how for 50 years, Star Trek influenced scientists, engineers, and even astronauts to reach beyond their potential. While the space station doesn’t speed through the galaxy like the Starship Enterprise, much of the research conducted aboard the orbiting facility can make the fiction of Star Trek come a little closer to reality. Several of the cast members from the original TV series share their viewpoints in the documentary, along with those of NASA managers and scientists. Over the years, NASA has created several videos highlighting the relationship between the agency and the Star Trek franchise. In 2016, NASA Administrator Charles F. Bolden led a video tribute to celebrate the 50 th anniversary of the first Star Trek episode.

In 2021, on the 100 th anniversary of Gene Roddenberry’s birth, his son Rod hosted a virtual panel discussion , introduced by NASA Administrator C. William “Bill” Nelson , about diversity and inspiration, two ideals the Star Trek creator infused into the series. Panelists included Star Trek actor Takei, Tracy D. Drain, flight systems engineer for the Europa Clipper spacecraft at NASA’s Jet Propulsion Laboratory (JPL) in Pasadena, California, NASA astronaut Jonny Kim , Swati Mohan, guidance and operations lead for the Mars 2020 rover at JPL, and Hortense B. Diggs, Director of the Office of Communication and Public Engagement at NASA’s Kennedy Space Center in Florida.

The mutual attraction between NASA and Star Trek stems from, to paraphrase the opening voiceover from the TV series, that both seek to explore and discover new worlds, and to boldly go where no one has gone before. The diversity, inclusion, and inspiration involved in these endeavors ensure that they will live long and prosper.

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World War III

• View history
• 2 Aftermath, first contact, and the legacy of WWIII
• 3.1 Background
• 3.2 External links

History [ ]

The flag of Colonel Green and the Optimum Movement.

Historians of later centuries had varying opinions on the exact nature of the war and its origins. Some linked it to the Eugenics Wars of the late 20th century , and while the seeds of the conflict may have been planted then, most scholars agreed it really began with Colonel Phillip Green 's ecoterrorism in 2026 which resulted in 37 million deaths. Green and his troops executed hundreds of thousands of people with "impurities" like radiation sickness , claiming that their deaths were for the good of future generations. ( TOS : " Space Seed ", " The Savage Curtain "; VOY : " In the Flesh "; ENT : " In a Mirror Darkly, Part II ", " Demons ", " Terra Prime ")

Among other parties in the conflict were the Eastern Coalition ("ECON"), which fought against the United States of America and the European Union . Various factions, including Green's cadre and possibly the ECON, used drugs to control their military. ( Star Trek: First Contact ; TNG : " Encounter at Farpoint "; ST novel : Federation )

Even during this period of global turmoil, the New United Nations worked for peace, and in 2036 declared that "no human being would be held accountable for the crimes of their race or forebearers". However, the group's efforts met with failure. ( TNG : " Encounter at Farpoint ")

The Mind Control Revolts of 2043 - 47 occurred during this period. ( TOS novel : Star Trek: The Motion Picture )

World War III reached its peak on 1 May 2053 , when nuclear weapons were detonated over London , New York City , Tel Aviv , Jerusalem , Mecca , Beijing and other cities. Asia was hit hardest, followed by the United States. Nearly half a billion people died in the initial blasts; Washington, DC and the surrounding three states were "blown off the map", and Earth was plunged into a nuclear winter that lasted most of the next decade. The post-atomic horror that followed severely destabilized civilization all over the world as governments fell and terrorist groups and rogue states detonated "suitcase nukes" and released biological weapons . The drug-controlled troops were used as cannon fodder in conventional ground battles after much of the global computer systems were sabotaged. Numerous small-scale conflicts erupted across the globe. The economy of the United States was devastated, and most of its citizens were reduced to living conditions worse than the Great Depression of the 1930s . ( Star Trek: First Contact ; Star Trek: The Lost Era novel : The Sundered )

For two months following the "outbreak" of World War III, Caesar's Palace in Las Vegas served as the operational command center for Colonel Amber's Regimental Volunteers and was the site of the final battle of the Siege of Las Vegas. ( DS9 anthology : The Lives of Dax : " Second Star to the Right... ")

When the extent of the devastation became clear, the remaining governments gathered in San Francisco to sign a peace accord. Even so, there were those who wished to keep fighting, like Colonel Green and others of his ilk. After Green's death, one of his lieutenants, Colonel Adrik Thorsen , continued terrorist strikes in the name of the Optimum Movement , and by the 2070s , gained control of Great Britain . ( ENT : " Demons "; Star Trek novel : Federation )

Aftermath, first contact, and the legacy of WWIII [ ]

First Contact with the Vulcans in 2063 inspired new hope in humanity and aided in recovery from the war's effects in some areas. Nonetheless, the post-atomic horror raged on in Asia, the Middle East, and the "new third world" sunk into total lawlessness. According to Jean-Luc Picard , these areas remained in "chaos" well into the early 22nd century . ( Star Trek: First Contact ; TNG : " Encounter at Farpoint ", " Up the Long Ladder ")

Gradually, as the post-atomic horror declined, new attempts at unified global alliances sprung up, including the European Hegemony , circa 2123 . These alliances eventually formed the genesis of the United Earth . ( TNG : " Up the Long Ladder ", " Attached ")

World War III's legacy was far-reaching, and continued to be felt a hundred years later. The war eventually became a popular subject in the recovered film industry. The philosophy of Neo-Transcendentalism was founded to advocate a return to a "simpler life" in response to the devastation advanced technology had brought humanity. Other less-benign schools of thought emerged, including the xenophobia exemplified by the Back-to-Earth movement and its more aggressive "cousin" Terra Prime , an outgrowth of Green and Thorsen's "Optimum Philosophy". ( ENT : " Home ", " Demons ", " Terra Prime ", TNG : " Up the Long Ladder "; Star Trek novels : Final Frontier , novel )

Ultimately, World War III and first contact marked a turning point for humanity. In the aftermath, mankind came together, putting aside the differences of race and culture, and unified in a way never before seen. ( Star Trek: First Contact )

Appendices [ ]

Background [ ], external links [ ].

• World War III article at Memory Alpha , the canon Star Trek wiki.
• World War III article at Memory Beta , the non-canon Star Trek wiki.
• World War III article at Star Trek Expanded Universe , the fanon and fanworks Star Trek wiki.
• 1 Ournal class
• 2 Starbase 25
• 3 Phalanx class

NEWS... BUT NOT AS YOU KNOW IT

‘New Nostradamus’ predicts exact date World War III will start

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An astrologer dubbed the ‘New Nostradamus’ has revealed his prediction for the exact date World War III will start.

Kushal Kumar uses a Vedic astrology chart based on planetary and star alignments to forecast the future.

He claims the chart previously envisaged rising tensions between Israel and Hamas, North and South Korea, China and Taiwan and Russia and Ukraine .

Some might say you don’t need astrology to tell you that, but he’snevertheless released what he says is the exact date a third world war could kick off.

And it’s pretty soon.

When does the ‘new Nostradamus’ think will World War III start?

According to The Daily Star , Kushal believes there’s a high chance World War III will start next month, on June 18.

The Indian astrologer said the date had the ‘the strongest planetary stimulus to trigger WWIII although June 10 and 29 may have a say as well’.

Who was the original Nostradamus?

Michel de De Nostredame, who became known as Nostradamus, was a French astrologer who published the book ‘Les Propheties’ in 1555.

The book was a collection of 942 poetic quatrains that apparently foretold future events.

Many people believe he correctly predicted the Fire of London, the French Revolution, the rise of Napoleon and Hitler, both world wars, 9/11 and even the death of Diana, the Princess of Wales.

Follow Metro on WhatsApp to be the first to get all the latest news

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He also allegedly foresaw the death of Queen Elizabeth II in 2022  – and even guessed her age correctly.

‘Queen Elizabeth II will die, circa 22, at the age of around 96,’ the premonition read, according to analyst Mario Reading.

He also apparently predicted King Charles could abdicate, with  Prince Harry  possibly taking up the throne, despite now being fifth in line.

The book reads: ‘King of the Isles  driven out by force … replaced by one who will have no mark of a king.’

Get in touch with our news team by emailing us at [email protected] .

For more stories like this, check our news page .

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Eugenics Wars

• View history

The Eugenics Wars (or the Great Wars ) were a series of conflicts originally fought on Earth between 1992 and 1996 ( TOS : " Space Seed "), which later shifted to the 21st century due to efforts by various temporal factions to stop the rise of Khan and the events that followed; Romulan temporal agent Sera suggested that "it's almost as if time itself is pushing back and events reinsert themselves." ( SNW : " Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow ") It has also been known as the Eugenic War , Second Civil War and World War III at different points. ( SNW : " Strange New Worlds ") The result of a scientific attempt to improve the Human race through selective breeding and genetic engineering , the wars devastated parts of Earth, by some estimates officially causing some thirty million to tens of millions of deaths, and nearly plunging the planet into a new Dark Age . ( TOS : " Space Seed "; ENT : " Borderland "; SNW : " Ad Astra per Aspera ")

The Eugenics Wars resulted in a ban on genetic engineering and centuries of prejudice against Augments , who were forbidden from enlisting in Starfleet , as were those erroneously perceived to be Augments due to their ancestry. It also resulted in discrimination against Illyrians , who were known to adapt themselves to colonies rather than terraform worlds. ( SNW : " Ghosts of Illyria ", " A Quality of Mercy "; DS9 : " Doctor Bashir, I Presume "; PRO : " Mindwalk ", " Supernova, Part 1 ", " Supernova, Part 2 ")

• 2 Rise to power
• 3 Conflicts
• 4 Aftermath
• 5.1 Related topics
• 5.2 Background information
• 5.3 Apocrypha
• 6 External link

Prelude [ ]

Records from this period are fragmented, and the exact circumstances have changed due to temporal interference. Regardless, the wars' roots lie in a group of Human scientists' ambitious attempt to improve the race through selective breeding and genetic engineering. They created a race of "supermen," popularly known as the Augments , who were mentally and physically superior to ordinary Humans. They were five times stronger than the average person, their lung efficiency was fifty percent better than normal, and their intelligence was double that of normal Humans. They also had enhanced senses, including an ability to hear beyond that of Human capabilities. ( TOS : " Space Seed "; ENT : " Borderland ", " Cold Station 12 ")

The Augments were originally created by the scientists in the 1950s Cold War era in the hopes that they would lead Humanity into an era of peace in a world that had only known war. ( Star Trek Into Darkness ) One aspect these scientists overlooked was the personality of the Augments. Along with their superior abilities, the Augments were aggressive and arrogant, flaws which the scientists were unable to correct at the time due to the infancy of the science. One of the Augments' creators realized the error, writing that "superior ability breeds superior ambition." That same scientist was ultimately killed by one of his own creations. ( TOS : " Space Seed "; ENT : " Cold Station 12 ", " The Augments ")

Rise to power [ ]

Khan Noonien Singh in the 1990s

The Augments originally rose to power and held dominance over a large portion of Humanity, beginning in the early 1990s . Among the most notorious of these superhuman conquerors was Khan Noonien Singh , who in 1992 became the "absolute ruler" of more than a quarter of the planet, from Asia through the Middle East . ( TOS : " Space Seed ")

The following year , a group of fellow "supermen" followed in Khan's footsteps, and simultaneously seized power in over forty nations. The people of these conquered nations, in most cases, were treated as little more than slaves by the Augments. Khan considered himself "a prince , with power over millions". It was unknown how he viewed or treated those under his rule, although they had very little freedom. Unlike the other Augment despots, however, Khan's reign had enjoyed peace. The people were not massacred, and Khan avoided war until his region was attacked. Khan considered himself a benign dictator or one who led by a form of "gentle authoritarianism"; as such he was thus among the most admired of the so-called " tyrants " into the 23rd century , being called the "best of the tyrants" by James T. Kirk . ( TOS : " Space Seed "; Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan ; ENT : " Borderland ")

A Romulan time agent named Sera tried to assassinate Khan in 1992, but could not do so until much later due to temporal interference that stalled Human technological advancement by several decades. Despite these changes, many of the aforementioned events still occurred, but were now moved forward in time. In this revised version of the Prime timeline, Khan was still a child in 2022 Toronto , being monitored at the Noonien-Singh Institute for Cultural Advancement , where the assassination attempt occurred. Unbeknownst to him, he was saved by a time-travelling descendant of his, Starfleet Lieutenant La'an Noonien-Singh . ( SNW : " Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow ")

Conflicts [ ]

Reports as to exactly how the wars began vary; some claim that Humanity rose up against Khan and his fellow "supermen," while others believe the Augments began to fight among themselves. Still others suggest that the Eugenics Wars were part of a larger conflict over the nature of freedom, alongside the Second American Civil War ( SNW : " Strange New Worlds ") Regardless of their origin, two factors were certain: the Eugenics Wars had a devastating impact on Earth, as entire populations were bombed out of existence, and that Humanity ultimately deposed the Augments. ( ENT : " Cold Station 12 "; TOS : " Space Seed ")

Among the areas affected by the wars was North Africa . One conflict that occurred there involved a battalion of soldiers that included the future great-grandfather of Starfleet Captain Jonathan Archer . In this encounter, Archer's great-grandfather was able to convince the Augment commander of his enemy's forces to hold their fire long enough to evacuate a school that was directly between them. Some or all parts of that account may be non-factual as Archer was evidently in an altered state of mind around the time he disclosed it. ( ENT : " Hatchery ")

The Augments were eventually defeated by Humans who were not genetically enhanced. Khan was the last of the tyrants to be overthrown, originally in 1996 . Khan and over eighty of the "supermen" were condemned to die as war criminals. They however went unaccounted for, a fact the governments of the time did not disclose to the public in order to prevent panic. Rumors were later confirmed in the 23rd century that Khan and 84 of his followers had managed to flee the planet aboard an early sleeper ship , the SS Botany Bay . ( TOS : " Space Seed "; Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan ; Star Trek Into Darkness )

The official number of casualties from the wars was placed at 30 million, although some historians believed it to be closer to 35 million, with another figure established as being 37 million. Although the wars may have ended, Humanity's fear of genetically-engineered beings remained well into the 24th century . ( ENT : " Cold Station 12 "; TOS : " Bread and Circuses "; DS9 : " Doctor Bashir, I Presume ")

Aftermath [ ]

Following the wars, controversial debates ensued between Earth's governments regarding the fate of thousands of Augment embryos . Uncertain of how to handle the issue, the governments opted to have the embryos placed into cold storage , unbeknownst to the general public. ( ENT : " Borderland ", " Cold Station 12 ", " In a Mirror, Darkly, Part II " historical archive ). The issue of genetic manipulation and Human genome enhancement continued to plague Earth well into the 21st century. In 2024 , Doctor Adam Soong began examining an old file from 1996 , which was called " Project Khan ". ( PIC : " Farewell ") It is unknown whether Soong went forward with a new genetic engineering project sometime after 2024 based on the original Augment project, or joined the one in Toronto, where Khan lived after the timeline had been changed ( SNW : " Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow ").

Doctor Keniclius

Soong and the Augment embryos

Genetic engineering of Humans was ultimately banned on Earth, as the concept was considered anti-Humanistic by Earth leaders. As a result of this, Doctor Stavos Keniclius was exiled from his community, which eventually led him to depart Earth permanently. The ban was placed primarily as an attempt to prevent another event like the Eugenics Wars, and to ensure that Humanity did not endure the wrath of another Khan Noonien Singh-type tyrant. ( TAS : " The Infinite Vulcan "; DS9 : " Doctor Bashir, I Presume ", " Statistical Probabilities ")

The ban on genetic engineering was challenged by the geneticist Arik Soong in the 2130s , when he stole some of the Augment embryos left over from the wars which were being kept at Cold Station 12 . Soong believed that genetic engineering was the key to improving Humankind and preventing illness, and that it should be given another chance. By raising the Augments himself, Soong believed he could prevent them from behaving like their brethren from the Eugenics Wars. His plan failed as the aggressive nature of the Augments dominated, and they threatened to incite war and cause mass murder. Starfleet 's mission to hunt down and capture the renegade "supermen" ultimately led to the destruction of the Augments, as well as most of the embryos. ( ENT : " Borderland ", " Cold Station 12 ", " The Augments ")

Not all of the embryos were destroyed, though. Some found their way into the hands of Klingons who, believing Humans were improving themselves in order to conquer the Klingon Empire , attempted to use the DNA from the embryos to enhance themselves. The end result was a mutation of a highly-contagious virus that caused massive changes in physical appearance, biological structure, and even basic personality traits of large portions of the Klingon race. ( ENT : " Affliction ", " Divergence ")

The continued banning of genetic engineering ultimately became a point of contention between the Federation and the Illyrian race. Since the Illyrians were known for using genetic modification within its members, Illyrians were usually barred from entering service into Starfleet and even use of their medical technology became banned within the Federation. The mixing of Human and Illyrian blood was similarly banned. ( SNW : " Ghosts of Illyria ")

In 2259 , La'an Noonien-Singh , Khan's descendant, traveled back in time to stop his assassination by Romulan temporal agent Sera . Sera told La'an that "Khan becomes a brutal tyrant. I mean, maybe Humanity needs the dark age that he brings in to usher in their age of enlightenment. Or maybe it's just random. Doesn't really matter though, 'cause if I kill him, the Federation never forms, and the Romulans lose their greatest adversary." ( SNW : " Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow ")

In the 2260s , after the USS Enterprise encountered a spaceship from the 1990s, Spock described the mid-1990s as the era of the Human crew 's "last so-called world war ", which was affirmed by Doctor Leonard McCoy to be the Eugenics Wars. ( TOS : " Space Seed ")

Appendices [ ]

Related topics [ ].

• Augment Crisis
• Klingon augment virus

Background information [ ]

In " Space Seed " the "supermen" of the Eugenics Wars were said to be the products of selective breeding; this was later retconned into genetic engineering.

Both " Space Seed " and Star Trek II: The Wrath of Khan give the dating of the Eugenics Wars as the 1990s. At one point during that decade in reality, Ronald D. Moore and René Echevarria had a discussion in which they observed it as odd that the Eugenics Wars seemed to basically be the only evidence of genetic engineering in Star Trek . " It's virtually never discussed, aside from the fact that there was this thing called the Eugenics Wars at some point, and Khan came out of it, " stated Moore. ( Star Trek: Deep Space Nine Companion , p. 431) Consequently, while writing DS9 Season 5 installment " Doctor Bashir, I Presume ", Moore focused on the idea that the Eugenics Wars had motivated the Federation into deciding not to meddle with genetic engineering. ( Cinefantastique , Vol. 29, Nos. 6/7, p. 49)

In contrast to the Eugenics Wars having previously been established as taking place in the 1990s, "Doctor Bashir, I Presume", set in 2373 , references the Eugenics Wars as having occurred two centuries prior to the episode, placing the Wars in the late 22nd century . As Ronald D. Moore later admitted, this statement was a production error, a line he had taken from The Wrath of Khan , but he had accidentally forgotten to account for the episode being set a century later than the film. ( AOL chat , 1997 ) Confessed Moore, " It was simply a mistake. The date of the Eugenics Wars is something that we have been studiously trying not to pin ourselves down about, because obviously they aren't happening around as we speak [....] What looked like the distant future in 1967 is not so distant any more. I don't blame them for not having the foresight to see that in 30 years this would become important in the series. " A production staffer from Star Trek: Voyager suggested the date had deliberately been changed on DS9 to account for the Eugenics Wars having not been mentioned in the "Future's End" two-parter. Moore flatly rejected that theory and responded, " We never talked to Voyager about it. " ( Cinefantastique , Vol. 29, Nos. 6/7, p. 50)

The original dating of the Eugenics Wars was reaffirmed by Phlox stating in " Borderland " that Arik Soong's Augments were pretty sophisticated for 20th century genetics. Phlox later mentions to the Klingons that genetic engineering on Earth was "banned decades ago," suggesting that the ban was not necessarily adopted by Humans immediately after the Eugenics Wars.

Manny Coto was a fan of this series of conflicts. " I was always fascinated by this idea of this Eugenics Wars, " he commented. " I love the backstory of that story. I just found that just compelling, the idea that it was instigated by these genetically superior individuals. " ("Inside the Roddenberry Vault, Part I", Star Trek: The Original Series - The Roddenberry Vault special features)

In "Space Seed", Spock describes the mid-1990s as "the era of your last so-called world war," with Leonard McCoy directly referencing the Eugenics Wars in response, suggesting this conflict could be World War III . In TOS : " Bread and Circuses ", Spock states that thirty-seven million people died in World War III – consistent with Phlox's assertion that over thirty million died in the Eugenics Wars (again connecting World War III and the Eugenics Wars) – but not Riker 's claim that six hundred million died in the nuclear conflict in Star Trek: First Contact , and again repeated by Burnham in " New Eden ". As Spock was speaking in the context of despotism, and what constitutes despotic "responsibility" is open to interpretation, his statement may not give the total death count.

In TNG : " Up The Long Ladder ", Data states that Humans were still recovering from the effects of World War III in the early 22nd century. This statement makes more sense within the context of a mid 21st century war than that of a late 20th century war, suggesting that World War III and the Eugenics Wars are not the same conflict, as confirmed in Star Trek: First Contact .

According to show runners, Spock was wrong and that Eugenics Wars happened much later during 21st century. Terry Matalas: " We discussed endlessly. We came to the conclusion that in WW3 there were several EMP bursts that kicked everyone back decades. Records of that 75 year period, the 90s on were sketchy. Maybe Spock was wrong? " In response Khan's own references to the 1996 date, that they simply have be ignored to make the series more relatable to the present; "No easy way to do it if you want the past to look and feel like today. Maybe because in 1967 they didn't anticipate the show still going for another 6 decades. " Aaron J. Waltke added: " There's also the ripples of the Temporal Cold War shifting the Prime Timeline in Enterprise — at least until the Temporal Accords put an end to that wibbly wobbliness. " [1]

Star Trek: Strange New Worlds attempted to explain the various mistakes and retcons by creating a literal in-series retcon in " Tomorrow and Tomorrow and Tomorrow ": the fact that Humans were not capable of genetic engineering on the scale of Khan Noonien Singh was actually due to interference by one or more temporally warring factions, including the Romulans. This allows for both the original statements regarding the Eugenics Wars from Star Trek: The Original Series and ones from newer productions to stand somewhat alongside each other.

Apocrypha [ ]

The Star Trek: The Eugenics Wars books portray a different view on the Eugenics Wars as being a more covert hidden battle between the genetically engineered "supermen" rather than an overt one in an attempt to marry the original dates of the Eugenics Wars with the events of the present day. This explains why the United States of America is seen as relatively unaffected in the episode " Future's End " and also raises the quite logical hypothesis that Gary Seven , who was present on Earth at the time of Khan's birth and would have known of the eugenics movement, was involved in the overthrow of Khan and the other tyrants. Numerous 20th century Trek characters appear in the story, including Rain Robinson (who at the end of the second book becomes Roberta Lincoln 's assistant), Ralph Offenhouse (an early financial backer of the genetic engineering program), Clare Raymond (her death is not an embolism but collateral damage from a nerve gas attack, Khan's assassination of Vasily Hunyadi, the fellow Augment secretly behind the Balkan conflicts of the early 1990s), Gillian Taylor , Flint (as "Wilson Evergreen"), and Jeff , who designed the Botany Bay – with Shannon O'Donnel and Walter Nichols involved in the project – primarily with technology reverse-engineered from Quark's Treasure .

In the Star Trek: Khan comic book series associated with the alternate reality , the creative team went with a portrayal of the wars as being an open conflict that outright affected the whole planet. The depiction of the wars however was filtered through the lens of Khan telling his own version of the events to a Federation court. As such, the series frequently cast doubt on how much of the events he depicted were actually true to his memory and how much of it was perhaps Khan simply spinning a fanciful version that would garner him sympathy with those present to hear his words.

In "The Rules of War", a short story from the anthology Strange New Worlds 9 , the enemy commander whom Archer's great-grandfather Nathan Archer negotiated with in North Africa is Stavos Keniclius.

External link [ ]

• Eugenics Wars at Memory Beta , the wiki for licensed Star Trek works
• 1 Daniels (Crewman)
• 3 Calypso (episode)

Screen Rant

Star trek: discovery’s ending had a major 33rd century federation reveal.

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Every Star Trek: Discovery Main Character’s Ending Explained

Star trek: discovery’s burnham and saru friendship is great, but i miss their old dynamic, 5 ways star trek: discovery’s ending set up starfleet academy.

Warning: SPOILERS for Star Trek: Discovery's Series Finale - "Life, Itself"

• The United Federation of Planets headquarters continues to remain in space in Star Trek: Discovery' s 33rd century.
• Admiral Michael Burnham, now with a son, Captain Leto Burnham, sets off on the USS Discovery for a new mission.
• Starfleet Academy will return to San Francisco while also being set in outer space.

Star Trek: Discovery 's series finale offered a glimpse of Admiral Michael Burnham's (Sonequa Martin-Green) future, revealing something significant about the United Federation of Planets of the 33rd century. Since jumping to the 32nd century, Captain Burnham and the crew of the USS Discovery have helped the Federation and Starfleet rebuild. After the devastation and uncertainty caused by the Burn, many felt that having the headquarters of the Federation on Earth made the planet a potential target. By the year 3089, Earth had left the Federation anyway, so the headquarters were moved into space.

In Star Trek: Discovery 's 32nd century, a Pax-class Starship known as the USS Federation served as a mobile space station housing both Starfleet and Federation Headquarters. After the collapse of the Emerald Chain following Star Trek: Discovery season 3, new structures were added to the station, which also served as the temporary location for the recently reopened Starfleet Academy. When Earth and Fed HQ were threatened by the Dark Matter Anomaly in Discovery season 4, the station itself, as well as its separate decks, became warp-capable starships that could relocate to a safe distance. Although neither the Burn nor the DMA are threats anymore, Federation Headquarters remains in space even in Star Trek: Discovery's 33rd century.

What happened to Captain Michael Burnham & the USS Discovery crew in the Star Trek: Discovery series finale, and where did they end up afterwards?

Star Trek: Discovery’s Ending Revealed The Federation Never Returned To Earth

Federation headquarters has stayed in space..

After Star Trek: Discovery season 5's main storyline comes to a close, the show's coda jumps about 30 years into the future to check in with Michael Burnham and Cleveland Booker (David Ajala). Burnham has become a four-star Admiral and made a life with Book on Sanctuary Four, and the two share a son named Leto (Sawandi Wilson) . When Leto, a newly minted Starfleet Captain, comes to pick up Admiral Burnham for one last mission on the USS Discovery, they fly to Federation Headquarters in a shuttle. Fed HQ seems to have added a couple of additional space stations, but, evidently, they never returned to Earth.

After arriving at Fed HQ, Admiral Burnham sets off on the USS Discovery for a new destination, where the ship and Zora (Annabelle Wallis) will wait for a soldier named Craft (Aldis Hodge), as seen in the Star Trek: Short Treks episode "Calypso."

United Earth rejoined the Federation in 3190, but by that point, Federation Headquarters had already been in space for decades. With species from many different planets traveling to and from Fed HQ, it was likely easier to keep the station in space. Plus, the ability to transform into a warp-capable ship has already proven useful once and likely will again. Earth might still be weary of being home to such a crucial facility, and the space station seems like a more convenient location anyway. With the advancements in technology in the 32nd and 33rd centuries, it's not surprising that a mobile space station would be the most effective location for Federation Headquarters.

Starfleet Academy Does Return To San Francisco

Star trek: starfleet academy has been confirmed to take place, at least in part, on earth..

Although Federation Headquarters will remain in space for the foreseeable future, Starfleet Academy will return to its original home of San Francisco, California. While there are satellite campuses located all over Federation space, the headquarters of Starfleet Academy has long been located in San Francisco, and only left Earth sometime after the Burn. Star Trek: Starfleet Academy will follow a new class of cadets, who will presumably spend much of their time on Earth, attending lessons. Still, it wouldn't be Star Trek without starships, and producers behind Starfleet Academy have assured fans that the show will still include ships and space travel.

It has also been confirmed that Star Trek: Starfleet Academy will take place in Discovery's far future, leaving the door open for some of Star Trek: Discovery's characters to return. Lt. Sylvia Tilly (Mary Wiseman) has a Starfleet Academy instructor since Star Trek: Discovery's season 4, making her the most likely character to make the jump to the new show. While nothing has been confirmed regarding any Discovery cast members, Academy Award-winner Holly Hunter will play the Chancellor of the Academy and the series lead. Whether or not any characters from Star Trek: Discovery pop up on Star Trek: Starfleet Academy , the next Star Trek series will take the Academy back to its roots on planet Earth.

All five seasons of Star Trek: Discovery are available to stream on Paramount+.

Star Trek: Discovery

Star Trek: Discovery is an entry in the legendary Sci-Fi franchise, set ten years before the original Star Trek series events. The show centers around Commander Michael Burnham, assigned to the USS Discovery, where the crew attempts to prevent a Klingon war while traveling through the vast reaches of space.

Star Trek: Starfleet Academy

After being closed for over a hundred years, Starfleet Academy is reopening its doors to those who wish to pursue a career as Starfleet Officers. Star Trek: Starfleet Academy will follow a new group of cadets as they come of age, and build friendships, rivalries, and romantic relationships while being threatened by a new adversary that could destroy the Academy and the Federation itself.