All language subtitles for The Center Seat 55 Years of Star Trek S01E10 Its Been A Long Time 1080p AMZN WEB-DL DD+5 1 H 264-playWEB_track3_[eng]

After the original series and the next generation,

it felt likeStar Trek
had been just about everywhere imaginable.

No, don't. No!

But it hadn't.

Deep Space Nine,
we decided, let's do it on a space station

Space station.

And there was
even more...

With Voyager, let's do
something that's going to toss us across space.

So instead of going out,
we're trying to get back in again.

...and that's where,
it might have ended.

- Welcome back.
-But it didn't.

They went back for more,
right back.

And then for Enterprise,
let's see how it all began.

Be ready.

So,
join us one final time,

as we look back at the end
ofStar Trek on TV,

for a while.

And you can see it all
from here inThe Center Seat.

Perhaps this is where it begins.

At the dawn
of the 21st century,

the 20th century's
longest running sci-fi franchise

was ready for a reset.

I'll never forget.

When
Deep Space Nine ended,

and we had the last seasons ofVoyager,

the studio was very stern
about wanting to get right into something.

And not just because
the struggling UPN network lovedStar Trek.

Voyager absolutely
was our premiere show.

And now
they needed another one.

The network is floundering,
we need the...

We need the bolstering
of the boom that a new Star Trekwill bring us.

We were asked to be
a cornerstone of the network.

So,
with the fate of a franchise

and possibly a whole network
in the balance,

Paramount turned to the man
who had been successfully

steeringStar Trek's course
on television.

Rick Berman was the torchbearer
of Roddenberry's vision,

and I think
he oversaw everything.

But he
couldn't do it alone.

Brannon and I had developed
a very close relationship,

and we decided that
we would do it together.

Brannon,
running the writing staff

and me overseeing everything.

Also on deck
was veteran Paramount executive, Kerry McCluggage,

who had worked with the duo
onDS9 andVoyager.

Kerry McCluggage
was a huge fan of Star Trek.

And so,
theStar Trek veterans began their new enterprise,

creating a brand new
Star Trek series.

Our goal was to make Enterprisedifferent.

but not different
for different's sake.

We wanted to explore
a new phase of Star Trek.

Except in this case,
the idea wasn't exactly new.

In fact,
it was actually really old.

Rick, he had
a concept for a prequel.

He wanted to set it
in Star Trek'spast.

The way forward
was to go back, obviously.

The final frontier,
begins in this hall.

In a time,
largely before prequels,

it was actually
quite a brilliant idea.

We're going to explore
the origins of the Federation

our encounters with

the species we've all
come to know and love

from the original series
and all of the other spinoffs.

Who the hell are you?

Who we are, isn't important.

Enterprise
would have the entire history ofStar Trek

as its playground.

In a time before
Federation of Planets was formed,

the new show imagined
a unique point in human history.

Starfleet and Federation's
pulling together with other planets,

with other races
aboard the ship as well.

And this is what
Gene Roddenberry wanted to see.

But would
modern audiences want to see it?

Or would they be opening up
a can of worm holes?

Inter-species alliance.

The jumping off point
for this new phase

was the mid-22nd century...

We were picking up
where the movie First Contact left off.

You're all astronauts
on some kind of star trek.

...which had seen
the Vulcans drop by,

only to catch humanity
at a bad time

and not expecting guests.

Look at the state of
the world that they land in, its war torn.

It's like, a guy
invented warp drive.

which means they've reached
a certain level of sophistication

but they're hillbillies.

Which raised
an interesting question.

Well, what happened
between First Contact where the Vulcans land,

we're meeting them for
the first time and Kirk's era?

To help them explore
this fertile ground,

in casting the new series,

producers wanted to emulate
the famous Star Trek triumvirate

that had served it well
since the original series.

The original Star Trek,
you had Kirk, Spock and McCoy.

Next gen, you had the Picard,

Data and Worf were sort of like
your Big Three.

And on this show, it's like,
who are the big three?

It's Archer, T'Pol and Trip.

Trip. I'm called Trip.

Much like
Kirk's Iowa farm boy,

Trip hailed from the heartland.

Keep your shirt on, Lieutenant.

All I got in the breakdown,

was that he's a good old
Southern boy.

I had done a play
the year before

playing this kid
from Oklahoma.

I did that and I stuck with it
and they liked it.

Fried catfish with hush puppies.

And then,
we're well into the show,

It turns out I'm from Florida,
and I said, "Wait, wait, wait."

This is nothing compared
to a hurricane

coming up through
the Florida Keys.

I'm not doing Florida,

and you guys
don't want to hear Florida.

And they were like, "Ah,
they're never going to know."

And I was like,
people from Florida are going to know.

No kidding.

Unlike Kirk's trio
from the original series,

this one would feature a woman.

Infinite diversity.

In infinite combinations.

Vulcan characters have to walk
this really hard line

of being tight asses
and somehow a little charming.

I won't dispute that.

That balancing act
became a challenge

for young actress,
Jolene Blaylock.

Is there something
I can do for you?

You are very beautiful.

Now, Brannon told me privately,

they just loved
the way Jo looked.

I mean, she had a slightly
gorgeous alien look to her, and she did.

Is there a problem?

No, sir.

For its captain, Enterprise
would be returning to the tried and true.

Rick and I had an archetype
of like Harrison Ford.

But naturally,
Paramount had a TV hero in mind.

Kerry McCluggage,
who was running TV at Paramount at that time,

was friendly with Scott Bakula.

He just seemed
like the perfect guy.

So much so, he never
even had to read for the role,

producers just took a leap.

Don't screw this up.

Bakula was a huge get
everybody was talking about it.

You know, he was a big star.

He had a fan base already
from Quantum Leap.

It was the biggest captain get
Star Trekhad ever had.

British actor,
Dominic Keating, - Coffee.

played Lieutenant Malcolm Reed.

No tea?

Yeah, no crumpets either.
Thank you.

But he had some reservations.

If I play this for seven years,
I'm going to go barking mad, mate.

It's going to be boring...
I'm going to go crazy.

But I just went, you know what?

I'm going to let some
of Dominic come through and see what happens.

Loosen him up a bit.

Awfully nice.

The ship's doctor
was an amiable alien

played by John Billingsley.

I'm Dr. Phlox,
the ship's physician.

Dr. Phlox
carried a tremendous amount of exuberance

and enthusiasm around with him.

Optimism, Captain.

It wells up
and it manifests itself.

See if you can find
a good place to set down.

Yes, sir.

Anthony Montgomery
played Ensign Mayweather.

I read it and it was like,
"Oh, this would be fun, I'd love to get this."

I was scared

because I knew that
there were really big shoes that I had to fill.

It must have felt like
you had a lead in your boots.

Obviously, I did well
because I got the job.

You know how to
tell him to shut up?

Shut up!

Communications officer,
Hoshi Sato, played by Linda Park,

rounded out the core cast.

Starfleet seems to think
that we are ready to begin our mission.

But what made
this ensemble remarkable was its unremarkableness.

They're more like,
people like you and me,

as opposed to this,
sort of, heroic, larger-than-life characters

that we're familiar with
from the other shows.

This is a crew who's brand new
to deep space exploration.

Wow. Whoa!

And with
a different crew, came a different kind of pilot.

Takes practice.

We were looking
to do something that had a little more pace,

a little more action.

And action we got.

That opening sequence
with the Klingon was fantastic.

Thanks to the unexpectedly
compelling combination of a Klingon and corn.

We actually, uh,
we built cornfields.

This was a set piece
that was corny by design, not by accident.

We had to
seed the field and the corn had to be raised

to whatever amount of feet
that we did.

On Enterprise, I wanted
to really push the limits of what we could do.

I wanted it
to be more ambitious.

The pilot forEnterprise,

broadcast on
September 26th of 2001,

seemed to have everything.

They threw a lot of
money at our pilot, and we shot it for a long time.

The stage was set forEnterprise

to be the best
Star Trek series ever to carry theStar Trek name,

minus the actual name.

They just wanted
to call it Enterprise.

So, not Star Trek?

It's called Enterprise.

And they didn't want to put
Star Trekin front of it.

Rick had the idea
to call itEnterprise,

which is the only word
that says Star Trek without saying Star Trek.

That's Enterprise.

Something that had
a slightly different tone to it.

Prepare for warp.

And the pilot was also
slightly less engaging,

if you know what I mean.

- Engage.
- Engage.

- Engage.
- Engage.

Let's go.

So,
what did audiences think?

I remember watching the pilot
thinking, "Oh, this could be pretty good show."

The show really got off
to a banging start.

We got an extraordinary
number of people

coming to look at that
and we got 13 million.

You must really
be proud of yourself.

The premier's
stellar ratings were music

to flailing UPN's ears.

But as for the actual music...

♪ It's been long wrong

The theme song was out
of the gate pan.

They had a big problem.

♪ Faith of the heart

Despite
fantastic ratings for the first episode,

when it came to the theme song,
the verdict was unanimous.

♪ Going where my heart
Will take me ♪

That sounds terrible.

And it
wasn't just panned, it was protested.

And there were a group
of people picketing outside,

and I thought, what are they
picketing Paramount for?

Standing with the placards
for "We hate the theme song! We hate the..."

♪ I can reach any star

I was accused of heresy.

Well, to be fair.

If anybody is to blame
about the theme song, it's a hundred percent me.

And it could have
been so different.

For a long time, we had
Beautiful Dayby U2 in there.

Against Beautiful Day,
it was badass.

There was
only one problem withBeautiful Day.

We're going to need money,
U. S. currency.

They couldn't afford
U2's Beautiful Day.

And its replacement
was not making anyone's day beautiful,

least of all Rick Berman's.

How dare you put
a song at the opening of a Star Trekseries?

But the first season
had a much bigger problem,

best summed up in a number.

Twenty-six episodes.

You know, you're doing
26 little movies.

Brannon's office, the walls
were covered with calendars

and when every episode
was scheduled to start shooting,

and we had to have a script
by that first day of shooting,

if not sooner,
or we were in trouble.

All work and no play.

You're like,
how are we going to do this?

Before long,
the writers were struggling to keep up with the schedule.

It could be
3:00 in the morning,

and what they would call
the finished script to date would arrive.

You know,
act four didn't exist yet.

You wouldn't even know
where you were going.

And that's when things
get kind of scary.

We just made so much of it,

you couldn't hit the bull's eye
every time, you know.

The writers
weren't only struggling with the punishing schedule,

they were struggling
with the long legacy of their own franchise.

There is something familiar
about all this.

Being the fourth
Star Trek series in a row,

I mean, there might have been
some going to the well one too many times.

There's even a name
for this condition.

It was franchise fatigue.

Captain, you need a vacation.

I have absolutely no intention
of taking a holiday.

- Is that clear?
- Very clear.

You know, writing a variation
of a theme for 17 years,

you try coming up
with a new episode,

twenty-six a year
for a lot of those years.

You'd think they would have
come up with something

a little more imaginative
this time.

Some episodes
were blighted by bizarre tangents,

including this scene
fromBreaking The Ice...

This is important.

...which literally
raised more questions than it answered.

When you flush the toilet,
where does it go?

It was starting
to look likeEnterprise was also going down the tubes.

A poop question, sir?

But not
all the scripts were stinkers.

Don't forget, Brannon
and the writing team

had the origin stories
of original series characters to draw from,

- for example...
- Andorians.

I wanted to do these people
with antenna.

But tried
to do them believably,

like, where
you're not laughing at it.

Both the audience
and Captain Archer struggled

to take the Andorian's feelers
as seriously as their feelings.

What?

They told me with the Andorians,

if you can't make
the antenna wiggle, we're not going to do them.

There's no need for threats.

Which was a shame,
because these Andorians

were more animated than most.

We made 'em wiggle.

You've earned
a brief respite. Andorian ale.

They had
wiring inside of them, and little motors.

And there was a puppeteer
off-camera

who would, you know,
work the antennae.

Stop looking at me.

Okay, okay. Don't get
your antennas in a twist.

Andorians on the Enterprise
was not only a shock...

I don't like the idea of having
the Andorians down here any more than you do.

...and an excitement...

Starfleet could certainly
use you.

...but it was
a signal to me

that Rick and Brannon
had liberated their parameters.

You've endangered us all.

But when it came
to the Vulcans,

some feltEnterprise had pushed
the parameters too far.

Vulcans are very deceptive.

And we thought, well,
what if the Vulcans just had a heavy hand

and they didn't think
we were really ready?

You're a stubborn man.

These were not
Spock era Vulcans.

The Vulcans were a stern kind
of mentors.

It's a Klingot.

A "Klingon."

They were more like
overbearing life coaches.

Your superiors don't think
we can flush a toilet without one of you to assist us.

We conceived them
as annoying nannies,

but a lot of fans were like,
those aren't Vulcans, you know, they wouldn't.

They wouldn't act that way.
Why are you doing that?

The Vulcans we saw
the first season of Enterprise were kind of strange.

I will kill him if necessary.

So that was controversial,
a lot of people didn't like it.

We're always supposed
to admire the Vulcans.

They're wiser than we are,
sometimes they can be annoying

because they're so logical.

But they made them unlikeable,
really unlikable.

Tea?

I only drink water.

Why do Vulcans if you're not
going to do something new?

Enterprise's Vulcans
were creating problems behind the scenes too.

Well, one key Vulcan.

Is there a problem, Commander?

Jolene,
she's not a natural.

It's hard to put it
any other way.

That's his theory.

She had an acting coach on set
for the first season.

As your highest ranking officer,

I assumed command
while you were incapacitated.

- What?
- Being...

Cut!

They literally, would
huddle off into the corner after every take.

That was quite
disconcerting as a cast,

Acting isn't exactly
a Vulcan tradition.

I literally was biting my knuckle going,

oh, we're not going to make it
past the first five episodes.

Jolene Blalock's
on-camera performance took time to get right,

but luckily,
not too much time.

You see very quickly, Jolene,
take command of the character.

It's not an opinion.
It's simple logic.

There were problems
at the top of the billing too,

where Scott Bakula
was slowing things down in a different way...

- By all means, I wonder,
-...because his peculiar...

if they'll believe that humans
and Vulcans will be...

...cadence was...

...swapping chromosomes one day.

...unsettling for some.

He paced Archer 10, 20 percent
slower, to put it bluntly,

than Rick and Brannon
had perceived it,

to the point of
their cutting scenes

because the scripts
are running way long

and there was a back and forth

between we need to
have Archer being oomphier.

But whereEnterprise
really needed more oomph was on the ratings front.

The drop in ratings
was quite dramatic.

On Paramount's
own struggling network Enterprise was languishing

in a syndicated television's
no man's land.

It's UPN, they were
the little Tin Horn network,

not in the whole country
they didn't have total penetration.

This antenna is inadequate.

In some parts
of the country,

you needed your own antennae
to pick up UPN.

It was not like NBC or CBS,
not everybody got UPN.

It's probably just white noise.

And even then,
the show's haphazard scheduling

made it hard forEnterprise
to find its audience.

Most affiliate stations,
they have

a contractual obligation
to air the network's shows.

That wasn't true for UPN.

Individual stations could choose
to move it around the schedule.

Hope for the best,
prepare for the worst.

Major cities would postpone
our show for the baseball game.

For those onEnterprise
it was starting to get lonely.

At the very first
convention we did in San Antonio,

we're there and it was like,
there's nobody here.

Well, it turned out
it never aired in San Antonio,

and it was always canceled
for high school football night.

The convention center
might have been empty,

but theEnterprise cast
and crew weren't alone at all

because the on-screen
camaraderie the crew shared,

was happening
off screen as well.

And when you're with people
for as long as we are, it's truly a family.

A fact Dominic Keating
was acutely aware of.

You know, my mother died
in the second season.

And, uh...

what could have been
a really lonely time...

was saved,

by the...

the closeness of that family.

Look hard at those stars,
find something that looks familiar

and tell me which way to go.

Star Trek, at its heart,
has always been about a quest,

andEnterprise
was no different.

The show was searching
for its identity.

In the first couple of years,
you know, it lost its way,

it kind of found its way,
it lost its way again.

There was not really
an overarching sense

that the show knew
exactly where it was going.

Obviously don't know anything
about writing.

Maybe
none of them did.

Brannon had, unfortunately,
put together a brand new writing staff

and a lot of them
just weren't able to get the voice of the show.

Some people left.

He was in desperate need
of someone who can write the series.

Someone like
this gentleman, perhaps.

When I got there
at season three,

the ratings were
already pretty low.

Everybody was scrambling
to figure out how do we fix this?

New writer,
Manny Coto was meant to be part of the solution.

He came to the show
having already completed

a lifelong apprenticeship inTrek.

I was one
of the generation that found Star Trek in the reruns.

That was a time
whenStar Trek had been out in television wilderness.

Now his favorite show
was nearing the same fate,

and he wanted to save it.

Star Trek was what made me
go into this business.

He arrived
just in time.

Paramount had already
pressed the panic button.

We got called into
one of the big bosses at Paramount,

you've got to do something
you've got to do something.

Shake up the show,
do something new.

Guys turn the ship around
or you're out here.

All right, what do you got?

Brannon's idea
for something new, was not new at all.

But it was an idea,
whose time had finally come.

And I'm like, I don't like
to do a season long arc.

With a deep disdain
for the concept during Deep Space Nine...

The studio
absolutely said, "No."

...now,
things were different.

The idea of doing
a serialized storytelling

was becoming more and more
common in television.

Yeah, the serialized notion
was super-hot.

But a real life drama
was about to unfold,

and it was going to change
a lot more than TV.

There's been an attack on earth.

A catastrophe would be
the catalyst Enterprise needed.

We took our cues from 9/11.

Build a weapon
to destroy an entire world.

The story envisioned
an alien attack on Earth

whose echoes of terror
would not be lost on anyone.

9/11 hit, I think,
when we were producing the first season of Enterprise.

So, it was
on everybody's minds.

Why would someone do this?

It was
either a brilliant idea or a terrible one.

The network bet on the former,
greenlighting Brannon's plans

for an epic tale
of war and destruction.

Ever since the attack on Earth,
all I've thought about is

getting back at
whoever was responsible

With, you know, 9/11,
still fresh in our memories,

if we're going to
do that story, we're going to need

a pretty big canvas
to service it.

Your species is doomed.

I had this idea for a species
called the Xindi.

They were
the scheming, enigmatic enemy.

Which species of Xindi
were they?

Star Trek had
created its own terrorists.

What everybody wanted to do,
was to go out and hurt the people that had hurt us.

I don't think
he'd be very comfortable torturing another man.

There was an episode,
and we essentially say,

I'm throwing you out
the airlock if you don't give me what I want,

You better start talking now.

'Cause in about 40 seconds,
you won't be able to.

He was torturing people
and fans didn't like that

because that's not
what a captain would do.

- He'll die.
- Hey, Xindi...

As the story
stretched into season three,

fans proved
to have little appetite

for art imitating life
inEnterprise's new format.

Why are you wasting our time?

The serialized idea,
I do think that

there was a momentum loss
as a result of that.

Enterprise was designed
to be a ship of exploration.

It did take us a little bit away
from the premise of the show,

the foundations
of the Star Trekuniverse,

A united federation of planets.

And the serialized
Xindi saga

wasn't doing anything
for the ratings.

Damn!

Enterprise looked
destined to have one more thing in common

with the original series...

Cancelation.

Just because of
the ratings, there was a very real possibility

that season three
was going to be the last.

Bad ratings aside,

there were actually
even larger forces at play.

The universe
that sustainedEnterprise

was now collapsing in
on itself.

UPN, that was a network

that was itself
on the verge of extinction.

We would survive
if UPN survived

and it was UPN's handwriting
that was on the wall.

And on top of all that,
behind the scenes,

a seismic shift at Paramount

was about to change
the balance of power.

CBS took over
Paramount Television,

and all of a sudden
there were a whole new bunch of executives at CBS.

All our bosses
changed virtually overnight, and the people

who had
built this franchise with us were gone.

CBS big cheese Les Moonves
was installed

as Rick Berman's new overlord.

He was the wonderboy
at Viacom, CBS and the like,

and he put Dawn Ostroff
in charge of UPN.

That meant
Star Trek stalwart, Kerry McCluggage,

was thrown out of the airlock.

Kerry McCluggage
was a hugeStar Trek fan

and when he got let go,
I was just thinking, that kind of pinched,

I'm not sure if that's
a good thing for us.

My impression
was that Lez Moonves

did not have a tremendous
amount of affection,

neither for the franchise
or perhaps, even the genre.

Jeez, you know,
I mean, it's like,

find somebody who does like it,

at least recognize that
it's a great viable franchise and let somebody run it.

The network didn't support us
in the same way that the previous networks had.

They don't get it,
they don't seem to like their own franchise.

But that
wasn't the only thing Les Moonves didn't like.

He didn't like Rick Berman.

Down in the ratings
and down in network allies

an under fireEnterprise

suddenly found itself having
to defend even its name.

Les wanted to put
Star Trek in the title,

and I think Rick
took offense to that,

and I suspect
he was trying to

increase the show's odds
of continuing.

And he wasn't
anywhere near done

undoing Rick Berman's work.

They suddenly jazzed up
our theme song

'cause apparently.
it was too funereal.

Yep, Rick Berman's
signature theme tune was in for a tune up.

The studio wanted to put
the fun back into funereal.

♪ It's been a long road

They asked me to remix it,

so it had a little bit more
of a pop feeling to it.

♪ I will touch the sky

Yeah, they put
a tambourine in there.

They gave it a little extra,
percussion or something.

♪ No, they're not gonna
Change my mind ♪

The dance version.

♪ I've got faith
Of the heart ♪

But this was merely
window dressing, a broken window.

If I'm giving you
a great show

and you're just
not liking the show,

I don't think
putting in a cymbal

or a tambourine
or whatever it was,

that's not going to do anything.

Moonvez
was recalibrating more than a theme tune.

He was retooling
an entire network

for a younger audience.

When he
took over the network,

they put much more focus
on shows for teenagers,

young girls,

their whole promotional wing

became less and less
focused onStar Trek.

And besides,
it was the early 2000s,

getting higher ratings
would be easy.

In one of the first meetings
I had...

The answer
was so obvious,

someone just came
right out and said it.

One of
the new executives actually said...

"Can we get a boy band?
on the Enterprise"

to play in like, the rec room.

Lord have mercy.

That was their pitch.

Like, are you kidding?

It was one of
the legendary bad ideas.

Star Trek's track record
with pop music, speaks...

♪ My friend

...and sings for itself.

Well, what's it going to be?

I don't think I laughed,
but I think that I probably said,

"Oh, yeah, that's something
worth discussing."

Their understanding
of science fiction

was nothing like
the previous three series.

Rick Berman felt
he was now in a battle

to defendStar Trek
from an existential threat.

Berman thought
it was his job to protect

the legacy of Gene Roddenberry.

The network,
they just cared about doing whatever they could

to increase the ratings.

Now get the hell out there
and make yourself useful.

Star Trek appeared
to be under attack from its own network.

Surrender or be destroyed.

Go to hell.

People say Les Moonves
hated science fiction.

I say that might be true,
but he hated a loser more.

Are you saying,
this was a failure?

Poor ratings led to
a purge of top executives.

Now, Les Moonves was preparing
to purgeStar Trek itself.

Kind of feels like being called
to the principal's office.

Les wanted to
replace Scott Bakula with another actor

'cause he thought
he was terrible.

I am not prepared
to walk away.

There was talk
that replacing him

with somebody else
was in the wind.

We can't be afraid
of the wind.

They were just
trying to figure out how to fix the ratings,

and I think they thought
maybe we bring in a new captain,

Maybe the ratings
will go back up.

It was a little silly.

The writers
prepared for the worst,

imagining their show
without Captain Archer.

Captain Archer is dead.

We were talking
about doing a season

where Scott is, if not dead,
then incapacitated or lost,

where you have a crew
trying to function without a captain.

I can't let that happen.

But the fight
to controlStar Trek was merely a proxy war

for the battle
between the executives.

Les and Rick
had a huge disagreement,

Rick refused to do it.

That speaks to Rick's loyalty.

And Rick was not gonna have it.

The answer is, no.

There's
a technical term for this

It became a pissing match.

Yep,
that's the one.

Rick rightly was like,
no, Bakula is wonderful.

I'm glad that
that didn't happen.

That would have been
a completely disastrous move if they had done that.

I can't say
enough about Scott Bakula,

he's just such a gent.

He made those years
joyous and lovely

and you know a lot of
Hollywood sets are not that.

Captain Archer's
charge was preserved.

But Rick Berman's defense
ofStar Trek came at a cost.

Rick made
a lot of enemies at the studio

because he was
protecting Star Trek.

And the one thing
that would have strengthened his case

for the status quo,
still eluded him.

The ratings continued
to go down despite their best efforts.

So if anyone has a suggestion...

They say
part of the deal for a fourth year

is Rick and Brannon,
let you guys step back,

shake things up and have
somebody else run the ship.

Taking less of
a hands on role.

And I think I was
just ready to move on.

Making room for
someone to move up.

Brannon called me
and said, I want you to run the season four,

I was like, oh, wow!
Really?

For the first time,
a hardcore Trekker

was about to take the helm

as Brannon stepped back
to focus on writing.

Brannon was never
a full bore Trekkie, like I was.

I have a deep love
for Star Trek

and I spent most
of my adult life there,

but I think I probably
could've used more passion

about the original series,
which is what Manny had.

As showrunner,
Manny Coto knew exactly where he wantedEnterprise to go.

Let's live up
to the promise of the show.

Let's make
Enterprisea prequel to the original series.

At the start
of season four,

Enterprise's newly installed
show runner,

found himself in charge
of the program he had grown up with.

I just wanted to do what
I thought the show should be.

But first he had
some loose ends to tie up

because executive producer,
Rick Berman had left

season three's audience
at the edge of a cliff.

For the third season finale,
they intentionally made a cliffhanger

'cause they thought
it would help them

get renewed
for a fourth season.

-What year is this?
- It's 1944.

Season three
ended with Archer

waking up in
World War 2, Earth.

So Season four
began locked into a story

set in one ofStar Trek's
favorite haunts, World War 2.

Hail the Fuhrer.

- Hail to the Fuhrer.
- Hail...

Look, it's Archer
in World War 2,

Nazis come to Star Trekagain.

In Hollywood movies,
Americans always win.

Too bad for you,
you're not in a movie.

This was a classic
alternate universe scenario,

in which the Nazis
won the war,

with aStar Trek twist.

The very last thing
you see is,

alien space Nazi.
Wait, what?

- That was an extraterrestrial.
- A Martian.

That was an attempt
to wrap up the season,

but leave a thread dangling.

But that thread
was intended to be woven into a rope

to form the backbone
of a whole season of space Nazis.

Or Spazis?

I didn't believe in
Nazi Martians, you know,

not until I saw one myself.

Season four was going to all
take place in World War 2.

This was not
what Manny signed up for.

Here's an opportunity
to run the season of Star Trek

and I'm going to be stuck
doing World War 2 stories?

I mean, I like World War 2
as much as I'm fascinated with history,

but I don't want to do,
Archer and these guys running around Nazi Germany.

That's not what Star Trek is.

I mean, maybe an episode
or two, but no.

I've arrived
at the same conclusion.

Even though
Rick and Brannon were still around...

I certainly was reading
and commenting on stuff.

...Manny
wanted to throw out the entire series arc.

At that point, it was his show.

Maybe it was in Manny

that Rick and Brennan found
their heroic Indiana Jones.

Nazis, I hate these guys.

Manny did away
with all of them.

Indy would be proud.

And with a clean slate,

Manny got to work,
mining what was

alwaysEnterprise's
greatest treasure.

We have plenty of species
that are fascinating to deal with.

Vulcans, Klingons, Suliban,
Xyrillians, Andorians.

God knows who's going to be
lurking around the next planet we run into.

But there was
one alien world Manny wanted to explore

above all others,

a true Mecca for all Trekkers,
if they could only go there,

Tell me how your planet,
Vulcan looks

on a lazy evening
when the moon is full.

We were like,
we want to go to Vulcan.

We want to see
elements of Vulcan that we've not seen before.

I want to see a sehlot.

Sehlot.

It's sort of a fat teddy bear.

What the hell is that?

Sehlot.

Hoping to appeal
to Trek fans old and new.

When I was a child,
I had one as a pet.

- You had one of those?
- Domesticated.

Season four ofEnterprise
further explored

almost every avenue
the original series had hinted at.

Prepare yourselves.

The Organians.

A non-physical life form.

Transpire shows up.

Permission to come aboard, sir.

They're calling in
all the favors.

Thank you, Captain.

A lot of missed opportunities

were being made up for
in the fourth season.

There were a lot of things about
the fourth season that were fun.

Great callbacks.

Orion females are known
for their extreme appetites.

You want to
tap into all these parts ofStar Trek lore,

but they haven't happened yet.

We're not
a patient people.

We'd redid the...

and I thought we did
a beautiful job in redesigning them.

If it was
an original series alien,

it could have a guest spot.

Enterprise also fulfilled
its prequel mission statement,

by rebooting and reimagining

a famous moment from
Star Trek: First Contact.

or should that be
"First conflict?"

Board the ship!
Take everything you can!

In a two part special,
Manny took fans back to the Terran empire,

first seen in the original
series episode, Mirror, Mirror.

Terror must be maintained
or the empire is doomed.

I love
alternate realities.

I thought it would be cool
to do the whole episode

as if it was from
the Mirror universe.

Apparently, some kind of
transposition has taken place.

In which
a bearded Spock showed us how

in a parallel universe,
things might have worked out differently.

That's when we got
to meet the evil Kirk and the evil Spock.

I am ordered to kill you.

Now a newEnterprise crew
was suffering

for enjoying the same fate.

And I went, oh,
I get to be a badass all.

Let's have some fun
with Travis.

We had to play, you know,
the bad version of ourselves.

Reed, I'll kill you
when I get out of this.

Manny Coto,
did this ingenious thing,

where in the mirror universe,

even our title sequence
was different.

I just thought
it was an opportunity to do

at least one opening credit
without that theme song.

♪ I've got faith
Of the heart ♪

The theme song
turned into

what the theme song would be
for a fascist television show.

It was better,
the mirror universe version

of the theme song
was much better.

By returning
to its roots,

Enterprise could finally give
the fans what they wanted.

From what I'm told,
the maximum setting

can actually
disintegrate a person.

I've been looking forward
to trying it.

The fourth season
worked because it captured

more of the spirit
of the original.

We were really
picking up steam.

I felt like,
we jelled as a family,

and by season four,

we had definitely found
our space days.

And I felt it was on an upswing.

Enterprisewas just starting
to get good and take off.

But just as
Star Trek Enterprise began

to show the promise
of its forebears...

We were in the middle
of shooting those mirror darkly episodes.

...things went darkly.

Season four,
we probably had four episodes left

and we found out
that the plug got pulled.

Will you kindly die?

On the eve
of its fifth season,

Star Trek Enterprise received
some bad news.

We would spend
some years together,

and now we were taking it
to the finish line.

Enterprise was canceled.

It really was sad
that it had to end, at the end of four seasons.

Sad,
but not unexpected.

This is quite a surprise.

Now it was a surprise.

Okay,
but only for some.

Come on, I mean,
what were you expecting?

I started hearing talks
of us being canceled the first season.

It was a miracle that
we survived as long as we did.

The way
Rick Berman found out said a lot about everything

that had changed at now,
CBS-run Paramount.

I remember the person
who called me and told me

that the show was not going
to go to a fifth season

was somebody
I barely knew at CBS.

We were never given a reason,
we were just told it was over.

Think the studio was just like,
this is it.

I was hoping
it was all just a bad dream.

But this wasn't
just a bad dream or about bad ratings,

this was about bad blood.

And that's what happened there,

it was a personality conflict.

The problem was
CBS' Les Moonves, who was in charge,

and he and Rick Berman
hated each other.

The pissing match
had been pissed and Rick lost.

Les Moonves just said,
"Well, I'm going to shut this thing down right now."

Whether
the hit onEnterprise was personal or professional...

I was just
as disappointed as... as everyone

...if it felt
slightly personal for Rick Berman,

it was just as hard
for theEnterprise crew.

Something in my eye.

Getting canceled
was such a slap in the face.

I took it
kind of personally, you know,

I've devoted four years
of my life to this thing.

Say it ain't so.

Yeah, and I'm afraid so,
it's done.

At least I'm capable
of accepting our fate.

The question now
was how to go out with a bang not a whimper.

I looked at Demons
and Terra Prime as the finale for Enterprise.

Enterprise has been
called home for what could prove to be

a pivotal moment
in human history.

A two episode arc
that proved the crucial piece

in theStar Trek
prequel puzzle.

An unprecedented alliance.

How the Federation of Planets
came to be.

Those two episodes
were really good.

And a lot of people
consider those the finale of Enterprise,

and they don't
count the finale.

That's
because for many fans,

the official finale sawEnterprise

not just taking leave
of its post

but taking leave
of its senses.

Rick and I
had been working onStar Trek for a long time.

Maybe the last one would be
a little Valentine to the franchise.

That's better.

But this Valentine
turned out to be more like a Valentine massacre.

What if it's actually
a next generation episode that we haven't seen?

I don't like it.

And so
the whole final episode

takes place
on a differentEnterprise,

with Commander Riker
from the next generation

taking viewers
to a different era.

Pull up a chair,
I could use the company.

It was likeStar Trek
had been hijacked by itself

and it was all thanks
to the holodeck...

End program.

where Ryker had been
playing back

Captain Archer's
Enterprise odyssey.

Have you learned anything
on the holodeck about breaking orders?

Not yet, I've gone back
a couple of days earlier to get a perspective.

The device to get
Jonathan and Marina

into our episode
was pretty clunky.

Not only that,

it raised some
uncomfortable questions forEnterprise fans.

So wait, did our show
actually happen then?

Are you saying that
these 96 episodes they happened on a holodeck?

Is that what I'm reading?

That's where I was with it,
like, "Wait, what?"

We'll see about that.

Scott Bakula
reacted so badly,

Brannon almost lost his seat
at the captain's table.

It was
the only time I ever saw Scott Bakula get mad.

He was mad at me.

Scott loathed
that last episode,

Here's to the next generation.

The cast
felt disrespected.

It wasn't really
their final episode.

We tried to do
something more, all encompassing.

and perhaps we diminished...

Enterpriseas a result.

I had to memorize this speech
in grammar school.

This was
an ambitious finale

designed to wrap up
much more than just one show.

Rick and Brannon
wanted a finale to wrap up

the entire 18 year
of Rick's Star Trek from Next Generationon.

That's impossible.

Rick and Brannon
wrote it on their own and produced it on their own.

It was not just the end
of Enterprise.

It was the end of what
we now call the Berman era.

Trying to book end to put
a bow on the Berman Era,

you know, it made sense.

End program.

But not to fans.

Great idea at the time,
but that's a much maligned episode,

judging from the reaction
to the episode over the years.

And so
18 years ofStar Trek, now known as the Berman era,

had come to
a confusing conclusion.

I never thought
it would come to an end.

All good things.

This wasn't
the cancellation of four years ofEnterprise,

this was the cancellation of
like 20 years of Star Trek.

- Impressive.
-Enterprise now had the distinction of being

the first live action
Star Trek show

since the original series
not to run a full seven seasons.

The fact
that we went four seasons

I guess,
in the club of Star Trek was a disappointment.

I think that's ridiculous.

We did 98 episodes,

in my mind, that's nothing
but a success.

You should be very proud
of yourself, Captain.

The reign
of Gene Roddenberry's hand-picked successor was over.

Nineteen years
of doing Star Trek.

It was incredibly rewarding.

After
more than 600 episodes across four series...

It meant a great deal
to a lot of people,

but to me, the thing
that I'll remember

more than anything else,
is that family.

...theStar Trek family
has survived

and remains the most enduring
science fiction dynasty on our screens,

after well over half a century.

Energize.

I don't think I'm quite ready
to have my molecules compressed into a data stream.

And despite
de-materializing many times,

it continues to transport us.

You know, Star Trek
always resurrects itself and reinvents itself.

You know,
it's a hard thing to kill.

We live in a world where
you can't turn on

the television without
a Star Trekspin-off.

There's a legacy
involved here

that we're privileged
to be a part of.

Today as one of
the most watched, most loved

and most influential
franchises ever,

for 55 years and counting,

theStar Trek mission continues.