VegasCon 07 - Braga Reflects On A Life With Trek August 12, 2007
by Anthony Pascale , Filed under: Conventions/Events/Attractions, ENT, TNG, VOY , trackback
Brannon Braga was one of the few Trek writer/producers to appear at this year’s Creation Las Vegas Star Trek Convention. Braga started off almost reticent, telling the crowd "it has been many years and so I am a little nervous." The veteran of Next Generation, Voyager and Enterprise made it clear that although Trek was an ‘amazing experience’ which occupied most of his adult life, he was not involved with Trek anymore and saw the con as a ‘nostalgic experience.’ After that, the Trek veteran’s appearance took on the nature of an exit interview with Braga inviting the crowd to get it off their chests:
I wanted to stop by to say hi to you guys and to ask any last lingering questions you had. This may be the last one I do so this is your chance to get out you final gripes and questions.
Wouldn’t change a thing…well maybe some things
Braga’s time as a writer/producer with Trek goes all the way to 4th season of Star Trek: The Next Generation and continued with 104 episode writing credits (more than any other Trek writer) for TNG, Voyager and Enterprise. He also co-wrote the first two TNG feature films (Generations and First Contact) along with Ron Moore. During his tenure there were certainly highs such as the finale of TNG ("All Good Things") and First Contact, as well as lows (who can forget Voyager’s Janeway and Paris evolve into lizard creatures episode "Threshold"). Braga was asked if he had any regrets and if he had a chance what would he do differently. His reply..
I honestly have to say that creatively probably nothing. There are certain episodes that are really stinky that I wish I hadn’t done, but how can I go back and change that. There were also episodes that turned out great that we thought were going to be terrible.
However, in subsequent questions the writer did seem to voice some regrets. For example when talking about the controversial season finale of Enterprise ("These Are The Voyages"), Braga seems to dislike it as much as most of the fans:
I do have some regrets about that final episode. It didn’t quite creatively align with the rest of the season. ….The final episode was very controversial and I do have some regrets about it. What we were trying to do was send a valentine to all the Star Trek shows. Enterprise just happened to be the show on at the time and it turns out the episode was a failure. It had some great stuff init and it was a cool concept, but it was languid. I don’t know if it fully delivered and it really pissed off the cast. It was a hybrid show. Rick [Berman] and I were involved in the franchise for years (Rick for 18 - me for 15). We felt like we wanted to send a valentine to the show, but I do concur it was not a complete success.
One controversial aspect of the finale however, Braga has no regrets for…
It was the final episode, we knew the series was over and we could do anything we wanted. Trip was always my favorite character on the show and I wanted to….I just wanted to kill him. I cant give you a coherent response. We wanted to do something that had emotional impact and had consequences which is something we were never allowed to do.
Braga also seems to agree with most fans regarding the direction Enterprise went once he handed over the show running reigns to Manny Coto in the 4th and final season, saying:
I thought Manny Coto did a great job. One could argue that Enterprise might have been that from the beginning. When I was seeing what Manny was doing it was like “you know what? Maybe this should have been the show from the start.”
Of course it wouldn’t have been a Trekkie gathering if someone didn’t ask Braga about canon and the perceived view that Enterprise violated canon by having the Vulcans appear differently than they did on The Original Series and subsequent series (and specifically having mind melds only being able to be performed by a minority of Vulcans). On this issue Braga was firm
Contrary to some people’s opinions we paid very close attention to continuity. There has always been a perception that we spit in the face of Star Trek canon and nothing could be further from the truth. One of the biggest beefs is that we violated the Vulcan culture, that we did things with Vulcans like the mind melds that clearly were not kosher with regards to the Original Series. But remember, cultures change. This show took place a long before the Original Series and Vulcan culture was different then. We got to explore that Vulcan culture was not like it was by the time of Kirk…in the same way that American culture is not the same as it was 200 years ago. Things change, technology changes…mind melds change.
[and how did thing’s change to where all Vulcans could perform mind melds?]
They learned how…Community College!
Braga also defended the decision to have the prequel series appear more futuristic than the show it preceded (in story arc, but not in real time). However his explanation for the more advanced looking ship was more pragmatic.
It is a paradox. How to make the show look cool by today’s standards and yet not cheesy like some parts of the Original Series by nature of the 1960s designs. This is certainly something that J.J. Abrams is dealing with and his prequel. You just have to bite the bullet and say that is probably more important to make the show look cool than be completely accurate… We certainly tried to make it look more futuristic than we have today, but less than Kirk’s time. But look at the stuff they were using on that show. They got communicators that are bigger than any cell phone. The laptops they used on Voyager were gigantic…they were ridiculous.
Regarding how the last two Trek show’s were treated on the new UPN Network, Braga also found common ground with the fans…
I think it damaged the show. If you don’t mind booting Brent Spiner later on I could stay up here all day and talk about this one subject. I think it hurt Voyager and much more with Enterprise, to be on a constantly shifting fledgling network that in some parts it was on channel 92 if you could find it and you needed the foil rabbit ears. Here we were shooting this beautiful show and posting it in high def and people were watching it on the crappiest stations imaginable. Tons of problems being on that network. Also we didn’t have a lot of money to promote. So I don’ think it was a great thing for the franchise. I cant blame it all on that. There were other problems of course, but it was truly frustrating.
One of the stranger questions was from someone who clearly was reading too much slash fiction who asked why they never showed a romantic relationship between Seven of Nine and Captain Janeway on Voyager. But Braga seemingly somewhat endorsed the idea.
There is nothing I would love to see more…maybe with B’Ellana. The homosexuality issue was always one on the show, even since Roddenberry’s time. As we understood it, it was Roddenberry’s feeling that ‘how would you know if somebody was gay?’ It was so accepted in the future, that if you try and dramatize it you just call attention to it. However, I still wish we did something more overt. Regarding Seven and Janeway: no way. The studio would not have let us…not with the captain. Plus it would have been dangerous for Janeway…you don’t know what kind of borg implants are down there.
It was not all critiques and canon nitpicks for Braga. A very young fan came up to the mic to says “I just wanted to tell you I loved Enterprise - it was my favorite show” and Braga joked “you are actually the first person to say that…thanks.” But then thanked him sincerely and also seemed to be genuinely touched by the young fan.
Braga left the stage with what seemed to be a farewell to Trek
It has been an honor doing this work for you guys and I enjoyed it as much hopefully as you enjoyed and I appreciate you coming very much.
UPDATE: Braga continues his conversation with the fans
See the comments section below (starting at #63) where Brannon Braga responds to this article and begins to take questions from the other TrekMovie.com community members. Thanks for dropping by Brannon!
NOTE: I know that it seems to be some kind of accepted blood sport to rag on Brannon Braga and Rick Berman. However (as I have noted before), Braga was part of some of the best Trek ever. Besides the ‘highs’ mentioned above, Braga was behind what are sure to be top episodes in each of the three series he worked on such as TNG’s "Parallels," VOY’s "Year of Hell," or ENT’s "Zero Hour." I wish many things (especially with VOY and ENT) were different (and apparently he agrees), but I also try and look at his career with Trek in the context of the full body of work.
Comments
For someone like Braga, who’s best known for his Trek work, the old adage of ‘you’re only as good as your last project applies.’
It’s sad that later failings probably overshadow the good work he’s done. Hopefully he can redeem himself with another success in something non-Trek related, in time.
In view of all the acrimony he’s been getting from Star Trek fans of late I think it was very ballsy of him to stand up on stage and take questions like he did.
I agree. I was rather shocked to see this. If I were him, I would be a thousand miles away from that convention stage.
Braga bashing is old and boring…let’s move on. He’s not the anti-Christ. No, I didn’t think his work was the best ever — but I did enjoy All Good Things!
TTM
I would agree with Braga’s comments about UPN’s shuffling of ENT contributing to its’ demise. By the end of ENT’s run, I wasn’t even sure what time and night it was on. Early on, it was easy; here in L.A., it just occupied VOY’s old timeslot, Wednesdays at 8:00 p.m.
i guess to proves that to fully enjoy enterprise you must look at it through the eyes of a child.
Forgot to say First Contact is the best of the TNG films as well!
IMO most of Voyager was crap.
I only watched about 5 episodes of Enterprise and gave up.
I’ve heard that some of the last episdoes of Ent. were good so maybe I need to watch those.
Star Trek was dead after about 1996. TNG was really good and a credit to Braga.
Can’t wait to see Abrams’ version!
I find it disheartening when I hear of the Berman-Braga efforts as ‘Ruining Trek’ etc.
Every show, Trek or otherwise, has had bad episodes, or bad implementations, and not everything is going to be perfect in god knows how many hours of Trek.
In the end, there was far more good than bad with their work, and for Trek in general.
Criticism is valid, I have some, but people should be respectful in their criticism.
BTW, This is probably one of the few Star Trek related sites I visit.
A fantastic source of information, and it has great posts on my favourite artificial usiverse.
To #8, dead since 1996? Watch some DS9!
Pretty interesting.
Enterprise is my favorite series, with Deep Space Nine a close second, so Braga’s okay in my book. :)
Sure there were certain aspects of the show, and all of them for that matter, that could have been better, but that’s the case with every series out there.
> One of the stranger questions was from someone who clearly
> was reading too much slash fiction who asked why they never
> showed a romantic relationship between Seven of Nine and
> Captain Janeway on Voyager.
Why is this a strange question? There was lots of subtext on Voyager pointing to some kind of interest between Janeway and Seven, including ‘The infamous missing pip scene’ (http://memory-alpha.org/en/wiki/Someone_to_Watch_Over_Me, http://www.youtube.com/watch?v=5ocH5o_AQHs).
One of the fascinating issues with this debate about ST:E, canon, and “Vulcan culture” is this constant assumption of “outgroup homegeneity.” Like, all alien cultures are a single, monolithic culture. But look at Earth. Today. Do we have one culture? We have a zillion. And so why can’t the Vulcans have innumerable nations, tribes, sects, creeds, cults, and worldviews? There is absolutely no trouble for canon if we learn that *some* Vulcans do things this way, whereas *other* Vulcans do things completely differently. This goes for all the alien cultures on Trek, which in all honestly have never been much more than simple cartoon stereotypes. (Tellarites are argumentative; Andorians are fearless, etc).
The reason I left TrekWeb and came here for my Trek news/reviews fix is because of the virulent anti-B&B-ism that absolutely infested the former. Legitimate criticism is fine, but those folks absolutely hated B&B on a personal level. I saw postings wishing they would contract cancer, postings calling for their assassination, postings threatening their families - at the time, some of the most horrible comments I had ever seen directed toward generally decent human beings (this was before BDS began routinely infecting political discussions). The ugliest posts would get deleted and the authors banned, but it didn’t change the hostile atmosphere. I still keep TrekWeb in my RSS reader, but I rarely visit anymore. Hate tends to leave a bad taste in my mouth.
The B&B nags always had a “what have you done for me lately?” attitude, ragging on their recent failures - Threshold (the VOY episode not the show), the early seasons of ENT - and refusing to acknowledge the string of successes they’d had previously. Berman had guided Trek since Roddenberry’s health declined; Braga had been written some of TNG and VOY’s best episodes. It would be nice to see history correct this tendency and give credit where credit is due, along with reasonable and valid criticism.
Not one of my favorite people.
i really liked alot of his work , but at the time of enterprise coming off the air , it looked like star trek the show i had love all my life , was being killed so i could not help but be very mad , if there is anything good to come from that is that with the new movie on the way , it shows that star trek is too big to be taken down by one failure ( not to say if the new movie falls on its ass it wont hurt star trek badly ) just that hopefully , star trek will always be around .
I don’t hate Braga. I consider him to be a great writer.
We got to explore that Vulcan culture was not like it was by the time of Kirk…in the same way that American culture is not the same as it was 200 years ago.
Enterprise was only 100 years before TOS.
Uhhhh, TNG’s “Parallels” ???
Duh huh huh. Everything Braga did was crap. Duh huh man im so cool
When the product is mediocre the people at the top are responsible unless the studio directly interfered.
Even when Coto took over it was better than Braga in command, but it still wasn’t the greatest Star Trek.
Michael Piller and Ira Steven Behr are possibly the greatest thing to happen to the Star Trek spinoffs.
Capt. Archer (to the little Vulcan girl who dared to speak up, T’Pol) in the very first episode of ENT: “You don’t know how hard I’m restraining myself from knocking you on your ass.”
Pleeeeeese… it’s crap like that which solidified ENT as utter garbage.
Certainly Braga has made his mark as a writer, and he’s certainly correct in how the network dropped ENT like a hot potato, but ENT stood out as having really questionable content… and I don’t mean silly fanboy wanks about ‘canon’ but a show that managed to insult the average viewer. imho.
I thought Manny Coto did a great job. One could argue that Enterprise might have been that from the beginning. When I was seeing what Manny was doing it was like “you know what? Maybe this should have been the show from the start.”
This statement angers me. All he had to do was turn on his laptop at any given time for three years and listen to what fans were saying. Why so stubbornly take a show in a direction nobody wants?
The main reason why Enterprise failed was because the characters were immature and childish. There is no way in hell I would let an angst-filled unworldly Captain Archer be the spokesperson for Earth. That’s insane. The writing was really poor.
#23–word. If you look at Braga’s early efforts it’s obvious that the man was quite talented–the Twilight Zone-ish “Frame of Mind” was one of TNG’s best, IMO–and if his ability (and that of Berman) to come up with fresh concepts for the Trek sausage factory declined over time, well, the same could be said for Roddenberry, Fontana, Coon, et al. What infuriated so many fans in the final years of Voyager and Enterprise was their smug attitude that they knew best, and that the reasonable feedback of many fans about things like incessant technobabble and catsuit-ed pandering was just so much irrelevant net chatter. Braga’s comments here are a little muddled and confused (was “These are the Voyages” a debacle or not?), but refreshing in their honesty. His association with Trek made him a rich man, but earned hm the ire of millions for his failures as well, a strange combination unfortunately not so unique to our time. In the spirit of spirit of the franchise that I think he never really understood all that well, I personally wish him bon voyage and success in his future efforts.
My problem with VOY and ENT wasn’t so much the lack of continuity or the messing around with canon that he talks about — it was the juvenile, one-dimensional writing. There was no subtext or sophistication to any of the stories, and the characters all acted like overgrown teenagers.
Now maybe Braga and Berman were required to dumb things down for the UPN audience, I don’t know. But their shows looked positively childish compared to the riskier and wittier shows like DS9 and Buffy that were on around the same time.
Braga is one of my favorite screen writers of all time… I love his work.
Needless to say Enterprise is my favorite show too, and I’ve been sick of all the B&B bashing that goes on on most Trek sites. I basicly only check Trekmovie.com any more because you can’t say anything about ENT without getting bashed.
Its too bad he has such a bad reputation, because the ideas behind enterprise (shwoing the development of the cultures we knew later) were wonderfull, his characters were fully fleshed out… Some people disagree. But to me, Brannon Braga is always going to hold a high place in my heart.
#25 You put it better than my post (#23). Enterprise’ characters were written like overgrown teenagers. Because of this, dilemma’s and plot obstacles were created not because they ran into difficult circumstances, but because the characters weren’t mature enough to handle them. And then we would here from the writers that ‘Archer is maturing’ and ‘They’re just trying to get their space legs’ and ‘It’s novel because they’re not perfect.’ No. That’s weak, lazy writing. As soon as Manny Coto stepped in, Archer started acting like a leader because Reeves-Stevens and Coto knew the difference between ‘lack of experience’ and ‘immaturity’. And T’Pol, just because you’re a little stoic and act like a jerk does not make you act like a vulcan.
Oh, I could go on.
Bragga had ballz for showing up. That’s all I can say.
I don’t agree with everything he did, especially Generations, and I don’t think he really “got” Star Trek, but he did some good eps. I think the logic about how they couldn’t have ‘big”communicators on Enterprise is flawed, and I heard this argument made at the time. The cell phone comparison is specious; a cell phone is not a point to point communcations device, it works by having stations boost its signal and utilizes a system of satellites to operate. Kirk’s communicator on the other hand, had nothing between it and the ship. They should have known this, or their science people should have. Roddenberry was just into stuff like that, and the tech wasn’t his strength. Maybe they knew this and just wanted to jazz stuff up, though. Also I though Enterprise the show with Archer wasn’t bad, but it’s hard to forget the time traveling alien space nazis at the end and their failure to identify Future Guy. Not to mention the starship buzzing the Chrysler building. I will say that those TNG shows were at their worst better than 90% of anything else on TV, which is saying something.
Braga is a good guy and a good writer. People who don’t like him…that’s their problem and no one else’s, and their anger touches nothing. :)
#28
Yeah, it’s not like Kirk was carrying around the equivalent of those first, brick-size cell phones or anything. The TOS communicator is actually a pretty decent size even for today.
Still though, I never had a problem with any of the design choices on ENT. I thought they found a nice balance between modern tech and TOS tech. I thought the bridge was awesome.
Yes I think Braga was only complacent in what happened. The real mastermind behind the suckiness was Rick Berman. I got so excited about Nemesis and when it came out and I saw it, at the end his name came up in the credits and I shot it a bird right there in the theater with everyone watching. At that point I knew that Star Trek was over and it would take a lot to see anything new again. Thank goodness that we have a second (third?) chance.
This to me sums up the weakness of some later Trek:
“Trip was always my favorite character on the show and I wanted to….I just wanted to kill him. I cant give you a coherent response…”
Rather than creating drama from realistic character struggles, character growth, internal conflict, external conflict — let’s knock somebody off. Yeah that’ll spice things up, be it Kirk, Data, Trip whomever. It’s lazy writing, and Braga’s earlier career evidenced that he was capable of better. They just should have changed things up sooner than they did, management-wise.
Braga wrote some of the best TNG episodes
first off all credit to him for going up that stage and facing the fans.
as poster number 11. Russ T.C. - August 12, 2007
“Enterprise is my favorite series, with Deep Space Nine a close second, so Braga’s okay in my book. ”
Same for me.
What a gutsy move. Knowing that many fans would love to chop him into little bits, he still attends a convention.
B & B worked on the same show for 18 years, under pressure from a studio wanting higher ratings and more bang for their buck. Who would not get tired, who would not get stale, but they still delivered some beautiful Trek.
TNG: The Inner Light, Best of Both Worlds, All Good Things.
DS9: Battle Lines, Emisary, A Call To Arms, Way of the Warrior
VOY: Year of Hell, Dreadnaught
Movies: Generations (Yes I liked it), First Contact (IMO one of the Best Trek Movies). Nemesis (excellent idea, poorly carried out. My big beef is the Director.)
VOY and ENT were on a weak network, shifting time spots, with no real advertising budget, nothing under those conditions would last long, yet they kept Trek alive for over 7 years on this poor network. Yes he and Rick should have handed the ENT over to Cotto earlier on, but was any one available. At least he is man enough to admit that ENT became stronger afet Manny took over show running duties. How many of us could do what they did for 18 years? Most people change jobs every 2 - years.
As for the sets of ENT, I think the balance between TOS and keeping it “realistic” was excellent, no touch screens, having to hit a button to open the doors, all worked well. Branon and Braga are fine by me, they have handed over to Abrams in the movie department, and if any new show comes up, hopefuly a cotto lead team.
I thought Bragas episodes were always too weird for Trek in the first place, and was suprised he was promoted to executive producer just for that reason alone. His brand of writing just did not mesh well with Trek.
And sorry ENT episodes:
The entire story arc of the 4th season as well as the 3rd season (great character development) and even some of the 2nd: Regeneration was a brilliant idea. And ENT ranks as my Fav with TNG and DS9 tied for 2nd.
Hemingway wrote The Old Man and the Sea, he wrote For Whom the Bell Tolls, The Sun Also Rises. He also wrote, Across the River and Into the Trees. I’m not comparing Braga to Hemingway, that’s ridiculous. However, even the best writers don’t always succeed. Churning out consistently good television scripts is impossible, and if you don’ t think so, try coming up with just one good idea, one well structured script, one script with good, compelling dialogue on each page. Try it under a deadline.
I thought Generations sucked. However, it’s important to keep in mind that it’s much easier to criticize than it is to create. A bad script means a bad film or television episode. That’s all. No one dies from a bad movie. No one even gets hurt.
I’ve enjoyed Star Trek since it first aired in the 60s. Braga and Moore and others have given us hours of decent science fiction, rare on television. They gave us First Contact which was a good film.
Killing Kirk was a mistake, killing Trip was almost emotionless for me and Braga had nothing to do with Data’s death. Data didn’t really die anyway, he was downloaded. I don’t attribute these things to lazy writing.
Was Spock’s death in STTWOK lazy writing?
The Nexus plot device was absurd, but, on the other hand, figure out a way to get Kirk and Picard together without another time travel story.
Bottom line, most art is bad, or mediocre at best. How many films have been made? 10,000? 50,000? . When they do those lists of the greatest, it’s always the greatest 50 or maybe 100. Shit happens (all the time). Great rarely does.
None of the ST writers need my defense, and I’m sure they can laugh at whatever criticism they get all the way to the bank. I’m as critical of bad Trek as anyone but i try to keep in mind that, to a degree, it’s like criticizing the .275 hitter who strikes out with the bases loaded. Go ahead an boo, go ahead and call him a bum. Hopefully, after you get that off your chest, you realize that you couldn’t even foul off a major league fastball.
Mmmmmm… “These Are The Voyages” was an awful way to end the series. I liked seeing Riker and Troi, but they should have been saved for an episode in the middle or towards the end of the season, but not the LAST EPISODE! That was really unfair to the Entreprise cast.
I really do think they should go back and make an ENTERPRISE tv movie or mini-series to give proper closure to that series.
39. Demode - August 12, 2007 - A great idea. Similar to what they are doing on StarGate. Who knows, it could generate a lot of interest in the series and could be done over a couple of movies, and follow up the founding of the Federation even.
#35: I’d add TNG’s “Cause and Effect” and “Parallels” as well as VOY’s “Timeless” to Braga’s “plus” column.
I want to strongly rebut the statements that Trek was dead after 1996 or 1987 or whatever. I found it to be very good right through the end of DS9. Voyager had some very good characters (I personally loved Kate Mulgrew’s Janeway), but also some aweful ones. Seven of Nine was without question the worst character in Star Trek history, and Jeri Ryan played the part unbelievably bad. But Jennifer Lien did decide to leave on her own accord. Voyager had good character interaction, but the stories were often repetitive and boring. The Borg angles and Seven of Nine as part of that, were the biggest problem. I often just skipped that week if I knew the Borg were in the episode. Enterprise was a good concept, and I think the actors were okay. However, until Manny Coto took over, the entire series was one DS9 or VOY script repeat after the other. The Xindi angle was a slap in the face, after having 2 series go for 7 years where they were fighting everybody all over the place. Brannon Braga was long viewed as Berman’s whipping boy, and perhaps now that Berman is long gone, the heat is off of him. Like I said, I have no problem with Braga, my dispute is with Berman. He turned Star Trek production into his friends-only club, which stamped out new ideas.
I consider Braga essentially a good writer, but not a great show-runner… he could really turn out great episodes (or movies) under the tutelage of an executive producer…but, when running the show himself, while he could still turn out great episodes, his administrative talents weren’t quite up to riding herd over a diverse group of writers.
But what do I know….
Thank you, Mr. Braga
The fact is that Braga/Berman had all the power of the success of the franchise behind them. Instead of creating challenging stories (Berman did work on some decent early DS9, I suppose) with political insight and dramatic realism like the under-appreciated DS9, the created simplistic nonsense that relied on cliche and nostalgia — and increasingly on sleazey outfits for hot women. They just didn’t care enough about creativity compared with ratings and profits. They helped kill the last couple of seasons of Next Gen, ruined Voyager, despite a reasonably promising beginning, and destroyed the francise with Enterprise with stereotypical alpha male heroes. They may be decent people, but they were lousy writers and have spoilt a franchise which deserved a lot better. Long live Ira Steven Behr and Star Trek: Deep Space Nine!
They also never gave DS9 its due credit, calling it ” too dark”. And JJ Abrams won’t fair any better with his idiot writing duo who approach drama from a similar, albeit a slightly edgier, angle. Alias is crap, and Abrams is a superficial hack.. Lost is only really as good as Lindeloff and Cuse have made it. Star Trek only really lived with DS9’s creation and died with its ending.
I thought Enterprise was a great series; What hurt it was the end of UPN and Paramount taking Trek for granted. TNG was good, DS9 was awesome and so was Voyager. I respect Bragga for owning up to his mistakes. Rick Berman deserves the majority of the blame.
He should have brought in veteran writers from the old series to help out both new and established writers from the previous shows. Lets wait to hold off an opinons of JJ Abrams’ take on ST until after the movie is out, not before.
#35
Braga had nothing to do with the DS9 eps you listed. Not production credits, not writing credits, nada. Berman’s involvement in the same is questionable as well, as the series even gave writing credits to Gene Roddenberry, who was dead at the time. You mostly have Ira Steven Behr & Ronald D Moore to thank for DS9’s development (and you can blame them for the Ferengi excess as well, but it’s more forgiveable than having The Rock wrestle Jeri Ryan).
However, I do offer kudos to Braga because it did take guts given the general feelings a lot of Trek fans have for him. I think in the early days of TNG he really told some interesting stories (I still think Phantasms was one of the better episodes of the troubled Season 7).
I think anyone would get burned out after spending so many years on the same project. I mean, Harve Bennett helped bring about Treks II-IV but somehow thought V was a good idea. Sometimes you just need to change things up. In fact, that’s how Berman & Braga came into power in the first place.
Kudos to Braga for showin’ up.
Nuff said.
Admittedly, we’re not hearing everything that was said during Braga’s time on the stage, but the feeling that I get is that Braga is a little remorseful that Voyager and Enterprise didn’t turn out as hoped. His responses have a “Casey at the Bat,” forlorn quality to them. I actually felt a bit sorry for him. It seems to me he gave his best to Trek, but in the end he feels he came up a little short. I can’t help but respect him for acknowledging the problems with those shows.
I’ll add my name to the list of people who give him kudos for facing a crowd that could have been very unruly. However, it sounds like they were mostly respectful, and that’s a good thing.
My hope for him is that he’ll develop a new vehicle (TV show, movies, whatever) that will allow him to step out of Trek’s considerable shadow very soon.
I pitched to Next Gen, DS9 and Voyager several times during the 90’s when I was living in LA trying my hand as a screenwriter. I also had quite regular contact with Brannon, Ron Moore and Lolita Fatjo during that time, as I assisted them doing grunt work at theTrek Writers Workshops they did for Creation at conventions. Ron was a great guy, as was Brannon… one of the quickest wits of anyone I’ve ever met.
But my opinion of Brannon changed when I pitched to him once for Voyager. In the room was Brannon, another writer (can’t remember who) and an intern who was taking notes. I was a pitching a pretty cool Harry Kim story, one in which he had a new love interest… the girl character’s name was Kayla if I remember correctly. Now Brannon knew me, and he knew that I was gay. This had never been an issure before, but on that day things suddenly were different. Although my story had no gay overtones, Brannon was determined to rattle me throughout the entire pitch:
Brannon: “Now Steve, is Kayla a woman or a man?”
Me: “Uh.. she’s a woman, Brannon. Harry’s not gay.”
As I started to pitch again, I was constantly interrupted with comments meant to shake me up and amuse his cronies in the room:
Brannon: “So… at any time does Harry actually get to ‘lick her wormhole’?”
followed by gaffaws of laughter
It went on like that throughout the rest of my story pitches that day.
I was so shook up when I left that I stopped and talked to Lolita, the script coordinator, and after much coaxing from her, I told her what happened.
Well she was so pissed at him, that the next day I got a call from Jeri Taylor, who apologized for him and told me that any future pitches from me who be heard by her directly. I think I went back and pitched to Jeri once after that. But the whole experience just left a really bad taste in my mouth about continuing.
So it’s strange. When I first met Brannon, he was a funny, witty and extremely talented and insightful newcomer to Next Gen who was excited about his work and about writing what he and Michael Piller always called “high concept”stories. Then I encountered him again during Voyager and saw a completely different guy… arrogant, insecure and … a bit of an ass”
Loved MOST of his work, but in the end, was not too fond of the guy himself….
Absolute power corrupts absolutely.
#13 neal —
You’re absolutely right, and I’ve had the same problem with fan reactions not only to ENT’s Vulcan portrayals, but in general any fan griping of any episode that usually involves some statement along the lines of “but [insert species/culture here] would *never” act like that!”
While I didn’t really enjoy what they did with the Vulcans on ENT, I did appreciate the attempt to show Vulcan cultural variation not only at any given time, but cultural change through time. I particularly enjoyed what they did with the Klingons in a similar vein — they showed that the “warrior culture” was only one segment of the population, and was only recently consolidating its rule over the entire Empire. People griped on and on about how we know from Worf that Klingon warrior culture goes all the way back to Kahless, etc etc, not thinking about the fact that every ascendant ideology traces its lineage as far back as it can, even if it wasn’t always dominant in reality.
Anyway, good point. It’s always bugged me that Trek aliens/cultures were always portrayed as these monolithic entities, without any acknowledgment of the kind of cultural diversity that exists in any society (not to mention any sentient species, if humans are any indication).
#47
Bennett didn’t like the Trek V story and only produced because Shatner begged him.
#50
Ron Moore had problems with Braga later on as well.
Braga wrote Year of Hell?! Didn’t know that, I give the man props! I LOVE that episode.
Its all about ego. Braga and Berman couldn’t admit they could do anything
wrong. They had tons of advice from the fans telling them they were doing
something wrong with “enterprise” and chose to ignore it. Making these
kinds of mistakes is contagious and if left unchecked they just continue and
the person making these types of errors thinks its perfectly normal to do so.
Braga and Berman both wrote very good episodes but in the long run they
both became egocentric and that is what damaged the franchise and almost
did it in. Being able to admit mistakes is good but its all a little late for most
fans. Braga seemed to want to dilute his own admissions of screwing up,
this makes me believe he still thinks he was right all along.
This is just a reminder of how it is good…very good that the Berman era is dead. So much was more bastardization than stories capturing the heart of that which made Trek great…much like the Star Wars Prequels when compared to the Original Trilogy.
This egotistical prick doesn’t deserve the dignity of being reffered to as affiliated with Trek even past tense.
Anyone that defends this guy is defending lazy-substandard writing and hackneyed creativity.
Don’t let the door hit ya “BRANNON”.
Josh T. (#56),
As usual, your maturity shines through with every post.
“This egotistical prick doesn’t deserve the dignity of being reffered to as affiliated with Trek even past tense.”
It takes one to know one.
Personally, I had no problems with any of the Trek series. They ALL had some bad episodes … “Spock’s Brain” for example. But I thought that DS9 and Enterprise were pretty solid shows. The last season of Enterprise was well written and produced. My favourite series will always be TOS, but I am open minded enough to look at the other series as they were meant to be… stand alone series that showed a different side of Trek. I have no beef with B&B. And i will keep my mind open to JJ’s new movie as well. Love live Trek!
I used to be one of those who felt Brannon and Berman were leading the Star Trek universe astray. Especially once DS9 ended and I became a little tired of Star Trek as a whole. However, I came back to the series in a big way as Voyager ended and Enterprise began. While I can’t say that Enterprise was a bad idea, I simply don’t, it took me a while to recognise that it had developed into a fine series by itself.
And while fans will continue to debate the merits of Brannon contribution to Star Trek, the many years he spent writing for it demonstrated his dedication to it. Although some of his efforts felt poor, I always believed that few shows had the ability to produce so many stellar episodes. It always sucked when a dud came along, but you always had the sense that next weeks episode might just surprise you.Which is what Enterprise did on a number of occassions.
Ultimately I believe that time and distance will allow fans to take a deeper look at the Berman and Brannon era. Unlike the era of TOS, we haven’t had the tell all books, the veiled allussions to disharmony, and the back biting. It’s why, when both Berman and Brannon eventually sit down to set the record straight, I’ll be eager to hear it.
Both men have been demonised by fans who simply disgust me with their attitudes. How can it be that fans of such an optimistic and positive series like Star Trek, can be such vicious and vile human beings. Desiring contempt and disgust on people, who for over a decade, produced some of the finest Star Trek stories and series, that enhanced the legacy of Gene Roddenberry and allowed us all to have something to talk about at length for years to come.
#54 “Its all about ego. Braga and Berman couldn’t admit they could do anything wrong. They had tons of advice from the fans telling them they were doing something wrong with ‘enterprise’ and chose to ignore it.”
You’re right. In fact, “We are very pleased” - an oft-repeated Berman quote - became a sarcastic, negative catchphrase being bandied about by fans on Trek sites a few years ago. :(
How far things have come! The new administration, if you will, is interacting with fans (via this great site) and taking their thoughts into consideration, as well as making a true effort to avoid past mistakes. THANK YOU, JJ, Orci, Nimoy, etc. Although the film is still a long way off, you’ve already brought the Great Bird known as Star Trek up from the ashes. You’re giving us confidence, and I have little doubt that you will deliver a product that - for the first time in a long time - kicks ass! It is an exciting time to be a Trekkie again! :)
Josh T is just bitter because not every hate B&B. I’m glad to see not all fans are close minded like him. Thank god we have more open minded fans and less fans like Josh T. Go back enjoy your three season of TOS.
#52
That’s what he said after it bombed :)
Brannon Braga here. I have to say, I am both heartened and horrified at the responses to the transcript of my appearence in Vegas. But in the end, there is truth in all of your comments. I accept the compliments and the condemnations. I wish my 15 years on Trek had all been smooth-sailing. I wish every day and every episode had gone without a hitch. There are arrogant comments I wish I hadn’t made in interviews, and in pitch meetings (as one email points out, and dude, I am sorry for that). I don’t think I ever really grasped how much I would be scrunitized in my position. I learned the hard way. Still am. Anyway, just here to say I appreciate the comments, even the negative ones: they are all useful and informative. Special thanks to Mr. Pascale, who seems like one cool guy.
- BB
#61 I forgot to put everyone. That is what I get for typing fast.
Hi Brannon…thanks for dropping by and I have to agree with the comments above that I do think it was a brave thing for you to do. I also hope it isn’t your last con, but if it is then I think it was a class act and good luck in your future endeavors
#63
Brannon, I have to say no one would be prepared for the level of scrutiny you’ve been under and for you to even come here and comment as calmly as you have gives me great respect for you. As I said above, I do truly enjoy your work on TNG and I think you wrote some of the best eps of that series - Reunion, Identity Crisis, Cause and Effect, Relics, Schisms, Timescape, etc. I know everyone dogs you and Ron about ‘Generations’ but you were both rushed into writing it under a very tight deadline so I think under the circumstances you both did what you could.
I’ll admit to not being a big fan of your work on the later series but hey, it’s all a matter of opinion, right? I think anyone would need a break after 15 years. Good luck on whatever project you’re headed for next. (’Threshold’ was a nice little show by the way).
Hey BB,
It’s great to see that you respect this forum enough to drop by.
It’s also great that, as we all should do, you’ve learned from your mistakes, missteps, etc. I am impressed.
I always had thought that you were, yes, an arrogant little prick, but, hey, nobody’s perfect. You were so very lucky to be involved with the modern mythology we call Star Trek.
I now wish you well and the best of luck.
-The Dr.
PS But, you know, “Threshold”….. really DID suck. (Sorry! I’m not giving you that one!;)
It’s obvious Voyager and Enterprise were creative failures, but you can’t help but feel bad for the guy. I think he genuinely tried his best, and everyone realized 7 years a little too late that he didn’t have the experience to run a show.
He wrote some great episodes “TNG: Cause and Effect, Realm of Fear, Timescape, Parallels,” but writing for one episode is really different than developing the creative vision for an entire series, where you need consistent character development, ongoing storylines, and a direction for the plot. On The Next Generation, Michael Piller was the Executive Producer, and Braga had Piller to handle the creative decisions of the executive producer. Braga was just part of the writing-staff and could focus on that one episode he was assigned to. Great writers do not automatically make great showrunners, and Braga is a classic case that not all writers should become executive producers. (at least, not yet)
In previous interviews, Braga seemed more clueless than spiteful when he became Executive Producer. It wasn’t that he didn’t care about what the fans were concerned about — he didn’t understand what they wanted and stopped trying to understand. This was the unique creative gift that Michael Piller, Ron Moore, Ira Stevens Behr, and Joss Whedon have in driving an overall vision for a series, and that probably also comes from experience and their own failures. This doesn’t take away from his talents. It’s a unique talent to be writing good science fiction like he has. And it’s a unique talent to run a show. Some people have one or the other, and some people have both.
Braga’s first, best destiny was to be a sci-fi writer under a competent Executive Producer. (TNG under Michael Piller) Anything else is a waste of material. Paramount realized too late it was a “bad fit.” It’s classy of him to take the stage and face the fans knowing what they think of him. He does sound remorseful that his shows didn’t turn out well, and it’s good he’s moving on from Star Trek, since it just wasn’t working out. He needs more polishing as a showrunner, and Star Trek is too big of a franchise and fanbase for him to be “learning.” Perhaps, he’ll find other opportunities (like “Threshold” even though that didn’t work out) outside of Star Trek where he can develop his showrunner skills, and heaven-forbid, maybe he’ll return to Star Trek one day and run a damn, good show.
Anthony Pascale - Pleas tell # 56. Josh T. ( The undiscovered cowpie) Kirk Esquire’ - August 13, 2007 to leave the language at home or I will gladly lead any boycot of this site, I left it for a while sick to death of his name calling and disgusting language, it is rude and childish and has no place in a civilised debate, people are warned but never barred from the site, and I am fed up with it.
63. B. Braga - August 13, 2007 - Thank you for having the backbone for going into hostile situations. And thenak you for many great years of Trek, take heart that there are many fans out there who loved and enjoyed your hard work. Yes you said some arrogant things but at some point we all do, to err is human. And the fact you can see ENT took off under Cotto is a credit to you, it is ashame that it was canceled. A big thank you from a fan.
Realist I did not see josh’s comment….as I said in another thread i dont read them all.
you are correct. Josh I have said repeatedly I do not want to see personal attacks and language like that you have been warned before so next one is permaban
by the way realist there are actually about half a dozen people that have been banned from this site for that kind of thing. And others that went on temp bans.
when the forums open I will be appointing some moderators to keep a closer eye.
that being said the ‘leading a boycott’ thing is not exactly the way to motivate me to do anything. I force no one to be here and this site probably has the most civil discourse of any in trek…including the official site. If I think trekkie boycotts are silly, then boycotts of my site are even sillier but knock yourself out!
Brannon, i just wanted to say that its great to see you here on the forum answering fan comments. I personally enjoyed your work and thought you were a good writer and at the end of the day, you helped to write some of the best of modern trek which we all as fans have to give you credit for.
I think it took great guts to appear on stage in front of fans, because it would have been really hard to judge what reaction you’d get, so you must have been really nervous, and i give you great credit for appearing, i also really hope it’s not your last con appearance as i think that will be a real shame.
I did also enjoy Threshold, i thought it was quite a clever premise, just wish you could have finished your idea.
Thanks for spending some time visiting us here :-)
All the best for the future, Matt
70. Anthony Pascale - August 13, 2007 - Anthony, I was not looking to attack or offend you, it is just frustrating that some people have to resort to personal attacks and language. The debate was going well, and on a level I have not seen lately, on many forums and then for a post such as that, making no clear point or real contribution just got under my skin a little to much, so please accept my deepst apology. I do enjoy this site greatly.
To those who comment “it took guts” to get on that stage: yes, I was nervous as hell. Because as you point out, I had no clue what the reaction would be. But I was prepared to handle it no matter what. And to my relief, the audience could not have been more gracious. Thanks to Adam and the Creation team for putting me there in the first place!
Mr. Braga,
I have a question I have been wanting to ask for a long time.
Where did you see ENTERPRISE going if it did get re-newed for a firth season? Or where did you see it going if it ran for a full Seven Seasons?
Just Curious.
Tim
I admit that I tended to villify B and B after watching TATV…which I still absolutely detest. But after going back and rewatching seasons one and two (which for some strange reason I never got into during its original run) I have to say that there are a few gems sprinkled here and there. Some of my favorite episodes were penned by these guys and after putting the show and the eps in context with what they were trying to achieve, I can better see why they chose to run with what they had. This only applies to Enterprise overall though. The “valentine” they sent to the fan was just horrible beyond belief, and I still can’t wrap my head around any thinking that made them feel it was appropriate much less appreciated. It’s like giving the gift of maggots and shaking your head in confusion when the chunks come flying.
Thanks for commenting again, I’m glad the audience were considerate towards you, its the least they could do really considering what you’ve given us over the years. I would have loved to have visited Vegas to visit the con, but sadly i’m in the UK so is slightly more tricky.
I hope you’ll visit more cons :-)
Matt
Oh and Mr. Braga, would you sign my ENTERPRISE box sets :-)
I am also gald the audience were considerate. After all you gave 15 years of your life to Trek, and much of it was great work, I must admit to really disliking “These are the Voyages” it’s just I realy liked ENT.
And I agree with some other posts I realy enjoyed GENERATIONS.
Tim
If “Enterprise” had continued, we would have kept going with Manny Coto’s unique vision of the show. Also, we would have explored the temporal cold war to its conclusion. We all felt that there were many more Trek stories to tell with that crew, and we were saddened by its premature end. Manny and I speak often about this. The show had really caught fire in seasons 3 and 4.
Brannon, didnt Manny try and wrap things up with the TCW at the beginning of season 4?
Brannon, I would have loved to have seen a season 5 of Enterprise and to have seen where Manny would have taken the show, including hopefully seeing another mirror universe episode as they were great, what did you think of them? Would a mirror universe series, mini-series or film ever be considered?
Thanks again,
Matt
78. B. Braga - August 13, 2007 - Thank very much for the answer it is realy appreciated. It is rather sad that the full arc of the cold war was not explored. I agree with Matt more Mirror Episodes would have been great see. I thought the cast and crew on ENT were up there with the best. Bakula’s Cpt. Archer seemed to have a Picard/Kirk/Sisko style to him, diplomatic, adventurous and passionate. It is a real shame that ENT was on UPN (Channel 9 in Australia, in theory). UPN and 9 seemed to changed timeslots rahter alot.
We wrapped up the temporal cold war somewhat quickly at the top of season four because we suspected we would be ending the show that year. Otherwise, we would’ve more thoroughly played it out.
It’s so great to see you posting here, Brannon. I’m sure that you already know it by your time at the convention and by perusing these comments but there are many people who appreciate your contributions to Star Trek, Enterprise included.
I look forward to any future projects in television or film that you may become involved in.
And oh yeah, not sure if you still follow the Browns, but you sported a hat of their’s in one of the special features sections on the Enterprise DVD so…
Go Browns! ;)
I am a huge Browns fan, having grown up in Canton, Ohio. Brownies!!
Not sure how much you can say Brannon, but are you involved in any exciting projects at the moment? And any views on J.J Abrams taking over the trek franchise? Plus (just if you missed it before) what were your views on mirror universe episodes and could they work as their own entity?
Sorry for all the questions but am just interested in your opinions :-)
Thanks again, Matt
# B. Braga
Thanks for stepping into our conversations. I find it a great deal of fun to find you and Roberto Orci and DB joining in and knowing that Mr. Nimoy has looked in as well. It shows a depth of caring for the Trek Universe and it’s fans. Thanks.
X
Brannon,
something that I didnt put into the article but is worth mentioning is how you said you were still deeply involved in season 4 of ENT - and that you even wrote or contributed to some of the scripts without credit. I dont suppose you could tell us which ones….I dont think the WGA monitor this site!
Mr. Braga,
Please let us in on which EPS of Season 4 you worked on. We won’t tell any one we promise!
And thank you for the respect you have been treating us with, it is greatly appreciated.
Anthony, thank you so much for bringing your site to Mr Braga’s attention, I have been a fan of his work for many years!
He should have been stoned on the stage. The franchise needs “reinvigorated” because of the damage he helped deliver through the shows…especially the later ones.
So he had some nuggets among the dung….every monkey is gonna find a bananna or two. That doesn’t forgive all the dung.
In response to #84 B. Braga
Very cool! Gotta love the Brownies. I’m from (near by) the Canton area. Attend the Stark (and main) branch of Kent State actually. :)
Dort - This monkey found a lot of bananas in his dung, thanks. Happily I was not stoned on stage. However, I did have one glass of wine beforehand, I must admit, just to relax.
Anothony - I was indeed involved in Ent-season4. But only in a supervisory capacity. Manny was really running that writing staff. I was there to help him fashion stories and give notes, which was only part of the time because Manny was doing an amazing job. I rewrote an episode called “Divergence” I believe. No offense to the credited writer. It just needed work and I was happy to help Manny out.
T.C. - I also attended the Stark branch. Two years. 84 and 85.
Yeah, I’ve seen your Distinguished Alumni Award in one of the halls of the Stark campus.
92. Brannon Braga - August 13, 2007 - Let’s hope you pop in more often!
Dort…uncool dude
89. Dort Munchouser : “He should have been stoned on the stage”
And you are one useless idiot, sir.
I’d just like to say that I liked Voyager and even though I stopped watching Enterprise after a while, when I came back in the last season, I was actually enjoying it. The stories had improved and the whole look of the show started to feel more like Trek.
I really feel that UPN was the worst thing to ever happen to Trek. I can’t imagine how much further Star Trek would have made it if they had actually launched a Paramount network in ‘79 instead of filming The Motion Picture. Star Trek has always been at the top of it’s game in syndication and has never performed well on a network.
Of course, there was also the need for a resting period for Star Trek. When ever something becomes wildly popular, soon after the general public considers it to be old and passe. This is true with anything from movies to fashion. At it’s high point, Trek was everywhere. You couldn’t walk into a grocery store, book store or mall w/o seeing it. Once something’s peaked, it’s best to put it away for awhile.
For the record: I have always enjoyed interacting with fans of Star Trek. They’re intelligent and thoughtful and really helped guide my thinking in shaping episodes of the show. That’s one of the reasons I went to so many Trek conventions over the years, and started reading the web when it got up and running. But I’ve always been shy about coming online directly. This is because so many of the comments are brutal and unproductive. Now, I don’t mind brutal: that I can take and respond to. But calling for my death and harping on about how I was boffing Jeri Ryan and what an asswipe I am doesn’t really compel me to come back for more. Having said that, I don’t necessarily think I’m so important that my being here means much; but it means something to a few people, and it means something to me, as well. The reason I’m here now is because the folks on this site seem to articulate their grievances in a civil manner, unlike another site I know, where I feel like putting a bullet in my head after about five minutes (”Why DON’T you put a bullet in your head!” someone will no doubt respond). Anyway, just wanted to share those thoughts. Bring on the criticisms, no matter how harsh, but please leave the ugliness behind. Thanks for a great site.
92. Brannon Braga - August 13, 2007 - I have one beef about ENT. These Are the Voyagers. I am in two minds about the episode. While by itself it is a good episode, very imaginative, fun (except Trips death) and clever. but as a series final it was poor, it paled to All Good Things and What You Leave Behind. Was there any other idea for a send off? Or was this a forced rush job by the studio.
Also, I can only speak for myself, but Nemesis, while I did like, I thought the acting and script was a bit off, particularly with Riker and Picard, the characters did not seem right. Why was Jonathan Frakes not asked to direct. And thank you for spending such a very long time with us.
Mr. Braga:
I loved your TNG episodes, and I loved Enterprise from day one, all of it, all four seasons. TATV put me off Enterprise for a long time–I was o.k. with kiling Trip, but it was done so poorly, it just seemed idiotic. No one on the crew had been promoted? Trip and T’pol never advanced past what they had in the second to the last? No one at the ceremony gave a damn that Trip wasn’t there?
I know that none of these are new criticisms, but I’d like to write them anyway.
I just recently decided to revisit Enterprise after seeing a couple on Sci Fi, and now I’ve bought the first two seasons on dvd, and will buy the rest soon. I’d forgotten how much I loved this show–I almost let TATV put me off it for good. I’ll stop before that episode, though, when I watch season 4! I don’t like the book relaunch with Trip alive, etc., I can live with his death, but i’ll let my own imagination fill in the years between and the circumstances, etc. It happened on the holodeck right? It was a made for t.v. movie for the 24th century, I’m sure.
Anyway–it doesn’t seem to be a popluar opinion but here it is: Enterprise was a great series, I followed it avidly from Broken Bow onward, and I loved the characters.
Good luck in the future!
100. Kaylee - August 13, 2007 “Enterprise was a great series, I followed it avidly from Broken Bow onward, and I loved the characters.” Agre with you one hundred percent!
Hi Brannon:
Thanks for being so active on this site. I think part of the problem was the vision of the producers was different than what the fanbase expected, and perhaps wasn’t as executed or articulated well to us — though when I watch your interviews on DVDs, I’m beginning to understand what you were trying to do. Correct me if I’m wrong, but I think the vision of the series is most accurately captured in the episode “First Flight” an episode that did a great job of showing the struggles of early space exploration. The intention of the series was NOT to make a prequel (with all the “references” to future Star Trek series), but to create a series that:
1. Approached Star Trek with more contemporary characters we can better relate to — the 22nd century being closer to our time than the 23rd or 24th.
2. Similar to the movie “The Right Stuff,” to show the challenges of early space exploration.
3. Re-introduce viewers to a universe we are familar with through the eyes of the characters — the strategy being that it could bring in newer viewers who have never watched the show
and in a way re-capture the spirit of The Original Series but for our generation. In essence, it’s like taking The Original Series and remaking it in the 21st century, but not necessarily rebooting. The idea is that since it is BEFORE the other Star Trek series, the series could literally stand-on-its-own without being bogged down with too many backstories.
ENT was a prequel in a sense, but in many ways, it wasn’t trying to be…not in the Star Wars way, that is. In fact, it seemed to purposely AVOID references to previous Star Trek, because it was supposed to be a “fresh start” and could stand “on-its-own.” This would allow a new viewer should be able to tune in and watch the show for the first time.
I feel like ENT was selling apples (a fresh start to the franchise), while the fans were expecting oranges (a prequel that neatly filled in all the missing holes in history — which Coto eventually did in Season 4), because that’s what Star Wars did with their prequels, and I think that’s the cause of a lot of disconnect between the fanbase and the producers.
Unfortunately, it didn’t help matters that the apples were not very good the first two seasons which made it difficult to “sell” the premise. (which is why Season 3 changed the premise, and after demanding so many oranges, finally got a true prequel in Season 4). I think the reality is any premise would have been sold on the audience had the writing been solid. Heck, the series could be the year 7560 on the starship Blah, and it would be great had the writing been good.
That being said, could that original ENT premise had taken steam if given time and the writing improved? Frankly, I don’t know how much “early space exploration angst” the audience could really take before it got old. And it could probably get ridiculous fast if ENT happened to invent everything from “Red Alerts” to “Escape Pods.” I think Manny Coto had the right idea with the pre-TOS premise. There’s much more you could write for there. If you had started over from Season 1, would you still approach ENT the original way?
Yeah–and I remember loathing First Flight third only to TATV and Similtude because there were no female speaking parts (or even female scientists or whatever not speaking in the backgrounds) other than T’pol and the gal shooting off a rifle in the bar. Sheesh–talk about stereotypes! Blech!
I had watched TOS in syndication as a kid in the 70s, TNG in graduate school, and the other two as a young professional. I didn’t have any expectations, I didn’t worry about canon when it came to a prequel–I just enjoyed Enterprise. I watched it for what it was, and I enjoyed the whole “first voyage into space” feel.
How could the ship look less sophisticated than the 1960s sets? How in the world could a show conform to the continuity of 4 shows that went before! Absolutely, 100% impossible! Heck, the shows themselves had continuity errors! I didn’t watch Enterprise expecting it to match. I watched Enterprise because I liked the idea of Star Trek–the franchise’s larger vision of the future. I liked the lack of a prime directive, I liked the limited use of transporters, and I liked the realistic Vulcans for whom supression of emotions was cultural rather some biological, written in stone destiny.
Anyone watching the show who expected it to match the other 4 could be nothing but disappointed–anyone who gave it a chance and enjoyed following the paths of Trip, T’pol, Archer, and the rest was in for a great ride.
Wow! This is really something. The Trek Remastered guys regularly come to this site for reactions to their new FX and even use the dite for an elaborate April Fool’s Day joke. Dennis Russell Bailey is a regular contributor, as ar several other Trek writing alumni. Roberto Orci screenwriter for the new film, visits regularly as well. Now Brannon Braga, one of the most important people involved with post TOS Trek on TV, has come to the fold.
This site really is becoming THE place for all things Trek. That’s just so freakin’ cool!
Mr. Braga, along with many of the others who have posted above, let me extend a virtual hand and welcome you here. It’s good to have you aboard, and I hope you enjoy the time you spend here. And don’t take some of the harsh words you may find here from a few “Movie Poop Shoot” type bashers to heart. Overall, this is a decent bunch on this site, and we don’t cotton to internet cowards who like to spit their bile then run away. I think you’ll find it more supportive here. In short, if you decide to stick around, you’ll discover that more than a few of us have got your back.
And I, for one, hope you do stick around. I may not have been a big fan of Voyager or Enterprise, but I’m endlessly fascinated with the process of creating and writing for TV and movies. You have a wealth of experience that I know many of us would love to hear about and possibly learn from. I hope you’ll give us the chance to do so.
Anthony, I applaud you yet again. You’re becoming quite the Trek insider, you lucky devil. I’m so jealous.
DeQueue - Excellent assessment. You captured very well what we were trying to do with Enterprise. But we were also excited to delve into Trek canon. Canon fodder for stories, so to speak. Not nearly as much as Coto did in season 4, obviously, but still… we wanted to do it all.
Would I change anything? Of course! Hell, man, if I could travel back to 1999 I would change a lot of things. Was Enterprise all apples? No. You gotta admit, you tasted an orange here and there.
It’s fascinating to see the myriad opinions here.
Brannon, thanks for posting here. I think you would have been OK posting at the other site too (assuming I am guessing correctly about which site you are talking about). While there would be a few jerks who would be rude, I think you gain the respect of most of your critics just by being brave enough to interact with them (as has been the case with other Star Trek writers that have posted online).
On that other site I have both defended you and also been critical. You have written some damn good scripts, many of which are very underrated especially those Voyager episodes you co-wrote with Joe Menosky (how come Joe M. never wrote for Enterprise, not even as a freelance writer?). But as a showrunner/creator you didn’t always make the best decisions. It would have been great if you had hired a co-creator/exec producer like Manny Coto right from the start. A prequel show needed someone who was a big original series fan among the showrunners.
Best of luck to you on your future endeavors.
Brannon if you had a real chance, how would you have done Trek with no strings attached, i.e. the way you wanted it?
Hi Brannon,
Thanks so much for posting here. I’m still stunned that you HAVE posted… and many times. Very impressive.
Thanks for the apology in your initial post. I’m the guy who related the “pitch session from hell” story earlier. Believe me when I tell you that reading your six simple words: “dude, I am sorry for that” made a world of difference to me. I really appreciate it.
Up to the day of that fateful pitch, I’d had many chances to meet and talk to you, Ron and Lolita. I always thought you were one of the funniest and most creative people I’d ever met. I’ll never forget your comment when you told me that due to budget restraints, your aliens in TNG’s “Schizms” ended up looking less like scary aliens and more like monks. Your throwaway comment: “not that monks aren’t INCREDIBLY frightening” still makes me laugh.
I don’t want this thread to turn into a personal letter, so let me just say; thanks again for the apology, and thank you so much for making yourself so accessible here in this forum. I think it’s fantastic. It says alot not only about the validity of trekmovie.com, but about you as a person and a fan.
I hope you stick around for a while.
Steve
Pity Berman is still a dick about it been a good episode.
Brannon, thanks again for taking the time to visit here and add comments of your own in response to the fans, i can’t imagine there are many other places where fans can interact like this with creators and producers of shows and movies.
I think just having you here, knowing that you are reading comments and replying to comments, makes fans (including myself) feel proud to be on this site. But also having you here has given us a feeling of respect for being fans and hopefully we have shown you to have a lot of respect from us too.
As another poster mentioned, don’t take the harsh criticism to heart, some things people have said are terrible and i’m sure are not meant, so don’t take them to heart. Most things like that, people probably say because they think that they’re never gonna get in contact with you, or that you’re never going to read them, but i bet that if they knew you were reading those comments while also commenting yourself on them, they may take a different tune.
I think we all wish you luck with the future, and i hope you stick around here replying to the topic, as your comments are great to read.
Matt
First Contact is my favourite Star Trek Movie and Season four of Enterprise (apart from the final episode) holds its own among all the seasons of Trek!
Also i forgot to say in my previous comment, that Brannon i hope you still carry on doing the convention circuit and that this years vegas con wasnt your last one, as there are many fans who enjoy your insight on the stage which you also must have felt when you were up there :)
Brannon,
Hope you stick around.
Your comments have been surprisingly enlightening.
One aspect of Enterprise that could have contributed to it’s downfall was it’s stylistic sameness to previous Trek series- that is, the style of acting, the cinematography, the lighting, the “music,”- so many things started to get so tired over the years. For a show set in an earlier trail-blazing era, it wound up playing it safe in these areas. Was this a concious decision on Rick’s part, or did it all just end up that way unintentionally due to the fact that so many of the same people were still on board from the other shows? I mean, I was expecting a raw, dangerous, pre-Pike version of space travel from ENT. Instead we got what wound up as yet anothr “version” of TNG or VOY.
I’d love to hear your input on this.
I think Braga is destined to forever be the Bill Buckner of science fiction. It’s true that Braga did a lot of great work during his tenure with the Star Trek franchise, but, unfortunately, he also presided over some notably bad stuff and that’s what he is most remembered for.
When discussing that bad stuff in interviews, he and Berman always seem to point the finger of blame at circumstances rather than at any of the creative decisions they themselves made.
Most people are in agreement that Brannon wrote some very good stories.
Early on when “enterprise” first started and the fans began to let the powers
that be in on the fact that certain things were not working they were totally
ignored. Statements were made by the producers that if the fans didn’t like
the show they didn’t have to watch. This was a wonderful attitude to have
towards the fans. All the fans wanted was Star Trek. Sometimes they actually got Star Trek most the time they did not. Painting one’s self into a literary
corner then choosing to either kill someone or blow something up is not very
good composition. These events haven’t had enough distance of time to be
let go by the fans who saw and enormous amount potential wasted before
their very eyes.
Wow. Difficult to know where to begin. But let me try…
Cyrus - Joe Menosky was brilliant. He and I wrote what I thought were some of the best ever episodes. Feel free to disagree, but if you look at those 2-parters we did… cool stuff. Joe moved on after Voyager. As a showrunner, I made good and bad decisions. Hopefully, mostly good. That obviously is open for debate but I feel positive about my career with Trek; but I also recognize my failings and accept the blame for them. And hey - I wish I’d found Manny Coto from the start, as well!
Steve - No problem. You deserved an apology. Just sorry it was a decade late.
Trekmatt - Thanks for your encouragement. I have no problem with harsh criticism. None at all. It has always helped me make the work better. It’s the silly personal threats that are irksome.
Dr. Image - Maybe we didn’t take the “look and feel” of Enterprise far enough away from the others shows. You might be right. We didn’t want to stray TOO far from what people loved about the show, so you can understand our paradox. Rick and I also had a studio that was a little nervous about the prequel idea.
Lee Gordon and cafe 5 - I have always taken responsibility for my creative decisions. Never once do I recall blaming the fans for not watching the show. That is crazy. However, there were many circumstances contributing to Trel’s eventual “downfall” or “loss of popularity” or “taking a break” or whatever you want to call it. I don’t think anyone can point to one reason Trek went off the air for a while. Even “Gunsmoke” and “I Love Lucy” came to an end! By the way, Bill Buckner might really be offended by your comparison to me.
P.S. Hope I don’t sound too defensive. Just engaging in a dialogue is all.
Brannon- Definitely agree on Braga/Menosky Voyager episodes. They were very cinematic and highly entertaining.
Any chance you can share with us what caused Ron Moore to leave Voyager? The official reason that he simply preferred a DS9 type management style is not really believeable (though it probably has some kernel of truth in it). At the time he seemed really pissed at you, but later on he said you guys patched things up. I understand if you don’t want to comment on this. Certain things are best left private.
It was great that he came and explained his viewpoints re: Trek.
He was quite interesting and I hope he considers appearing again.
Hey Brannon…nice to see you coming back for more…it is like this is an extension of your talk. By the way There are a number of other current articles up…many of which are indirectly talking about you. The big topic of the moment for many fans is the shatner/kirk/new movie/post-Generations resurrection thing
as the co-writer of Generations maybe you might find those topics of interest too. You would be surprised how often the word ‘Nexus’ comes up in every article about The Shat!
Thanks for your reply Brannon, and i agree that the Braga/Menosky Voyager episodes were very good, Voyager is personally my favourite trek series and i felt the majority of the stories were well written and well handled.
Btw isn’t it your birthday today Brannon? (looks at IMDB.com) if so, happy birthday!! :)
Matt
#105
Thanks Brannon for the response. I definitely tasted some oranges (prequel elements) in Seasons 1 and 2 — “The Andorian Incident,” “Shadows of P’Jem” “Minefield” “Cease Fire” “Judgment” to name a few. And these episodes did a nice job of tying-into the mythology of Star Trek. (And all of Season 4 was essentially these type of “prequel” episodes)
But I also wanted to say, I do enjoy apples! It didn’t have to be all oranges “prequel stories” for it to be good. I definitely welcomed a “fresh start” and “fresh look” to the franchise about “dangerous early space exploration.” But I absolutely agree with Dr. Image in #113. For a show that wanted to be “different” and “more contemporary” it stylistically looked EXACTLY the same as VOY and TNG. The characters and the episode still had a “24th century” feel to them, and the show could easily have taken place in the 24th century.
It is this “stylistic sameness” that made the apples difficult to accepted, because ENT felt like Star Trek: Voyager, Part II. Instead of the “fresh start” that it wanted to be, it felt like it just wanted to mimic TNG and VOY, and was “afraid” to take risks and try new things. And as #113 alluded to, why did the style stay so “safe” — so close to how VOY and TNG was produced? Was this a conscious decision on Rick Berman’s part to stay “close” to how TNG and VOY was done? Was it UPN? Were there things you WANTED to try, but were told not to? (It might be touchy if there were so limitations that were placed on you that you can’t talk about)
I don’t know if you’ve ever watched Joss Whedon’s “Firefly” — it’s very different from Star Trek, but it’s a style that could have easily been adapted for ENT. But yeah, that would have been a really different type of show, and maybe from a “business-sense” it seemed too risky to make Star Trek so different that it could potentially lose viewers used to a certain type of show. But it’s risks that keep viewers interested in tuning in.
I do believe ENT did make a conscious effort to try to make the ship and the characters different, but in the end, it just turned out WAY too similar to what we’ve seen before on VOY and TNG. Maybe if the same creative stuff is involved, it’s just too hard to break out of a certain writing and production style. Maybe there were restrictions from the studio or Rick. I don’t know. In any case, I think the fans definitely would have welcomed something radically different and innovative but was surprised to tune in and watch exactly the same show.
Yes, there were limitations — or opinions would be a better word — placed on us during the show’s development. But that’s part of the process. Paramount was understandably worried about protecting their huge franchise. You know, Rick’s initial idea was to play the first season on Earth as they were building the very first warp ship. But that was way too off-concept, I think, for the studio. Maybe they were right, who knows. Remember that the previous Trek shows were very successful for the most part. It’s a balancing act when you try to “reinvent”. So we ended up with Enterprise, an excellent TV show, if you ask me, but also with its share of compromises and problems. And yes, writing was a large part of it. I think we did some superb work, but there were times that we did things that felt too familiar. Sometimes without realizing it. Quite a strange situation, working on the fifth incarnation of a series. Quite a challenge, as you can imagine.
I can imagine that doing a 5th incarnation of a series would be pretty tricky in trying to do something different, so don’t blame you for that. Rick’s idea doesnt sound too bad, may be if that took place for like the first half of the 1st season or something, that would have been quite a good intro. It was similar to when you introduced the NX-02, it was great to watch the lead up to her construction and find out why they needed another ship, what they would do with it etc, so i think that would have worked quite well at the start of Ent with the NX-01.
Whoa. This is definitely one of the more exciting days of my month. Brannon Braga is HERE! If TrekMatt says truth, happy birthday as well. I won’t ask your age. :P
Could you… just never leave? I mean, we Trekkies get a lot of Q&A’s with set design people and former actors and the odd writer, and you can actually get in touch with some of the authors in various places, and I seem to recall Rick Sternbach floating around the TrekBBS… but what my dream (and the dream of a lot of fans) really is is to talk to the guy who makes it all happen, who has the vision, who somehow pounds out those stories we tune in to see every week. We’re the fanbase that was “too cerebral” for NBC–what we really want to hear about are the *stories*, more than the actors, the sets, anything. Your insight would be incredibly valuable, and there are literally millions of us who want to hear what you have to say on virtually every subject in Trek.
At the very least, if you’re ready to take one last look at what you leave behind, accept this as a return to grace, and move on to a new chosen realm (pardon the puns)… could we have one big Q&A session? Please? (Or could you take a cue from your co-executive producer and write a book?)
As for the interview itself, I’m very pleased to see that there is some acknowledgement of the horror that was TATV. While “All Good Things…” was my favorite Star Trek episode of all time, capturing the essence of all things good about the franchise, TATV was unquestionably the worst, suffering from terrible pacing–”languid” is an excellent choice of words–and a badly executed premise made worse by the fact that it was a series finale and that Trip was killed uselessly. The murder of Trip was irrational and pointless. I know that writers sometimes get irrational urges, but that was definitely a case where Mr. Braga ought to have “murdered his darlings,” as I believe the saying goes.
But I did enjoy “Threshold” (yes, the episode). :D
I will also defend to the death Mr. Braga’s articulation of Enterprise’s effects on canon. They did a great job trying to keep canon sacrosanct throughout the series. The mistake I saw was not so much that they violated canon, but that they were so used to using the same old bag of tricks, of returning to the same well, that they were stuck reusing old Voyager plots (”Aquisition” is a good illustration of this, IMO–although “Resistance” was great and a demonstration of how that old bag of tricks can still be given new life). I *especially* liked their portrayal of the Vulcans, although it would not have in the end been satisfying without the explanation for the transformation of Vulcan society provided by Coto and the Reeves-Stephens.
I’ll also agree with the murder UPN did on the ratings of ENT and latter-day VOY. I did some close scrutiny of that back when I was at TrekUnited (does anyone still remember TU? Did Braga ever hear of it?), and I concluded that Enterprise absolutely should have ratings of at least 3.5 points in its final season–if not more–if UPN hadn’t tried so hard to kill it. (Direct competition with Stargate, you Klingon bastards!) Lesson learned: syndication forever.
I wonder why no one has mentioned yet Mr. Braga’s strange idea of sexuality on the show, though. Troi/Worf? Trip/T’Pol? Torres/Paris? Archer/T’Pol? And, of course, the one that really gets people rowdy: C/7? What the dskopach? Let’s add this to the random catsuits, the occasional supposedly comedic but incredibly juvenile incidents where Hoshi would lose her shirt and undergarments, and Vulcan Neuropressure, and we have a fairly complete picture of what a lot of fans considered alternately befuddling and insulting presentations of sexuality in Braga-run shows. I have no idea what role Mr. Braga played in these various creative decisions, but… seriously, what was going on? The Theiss Titilation Factor is one thing, but ENT and VOY’s attempts to follow TOS’s spirit of free love just came off looking strange and frequently annoying.
Loved “Divergence.” The image of Trip climbing between two ships on a cable was one of the classics, and on seeing it I immediately said, “Braga.”
Anyhow, to close: Mr. Braga, thank you for being here, thank you for doing that convention, and I hope we hear more from you in the future. It has indeed been a pleasure to watch your work in all its forms for these past fifteen years.
#124
Thanks again Brannon for the response. I think I would have loved having the first season on Earth for ENTERPRISE! That sounds like a really neat idea. One of the things I felt was really missing from ENTERPRISE was…Earth. What are humans like on Earth in this century? How did they solve their problems to become the paradise it is in the 23rd century? Is there a United Earth? “Demons/Terra Prime” dipped on that subject a little bit in the 4th season, and it was very intriguing. It had a little bit of a “Earth: Final Conflict” feel to it.
I totally understand the decision to stay with the starship-exploration premise, given the risk of an audience that may tune off if it’s too off-concept. (The audience initially tuned off Deep Space Nine for that reason, before they gradually accepted it over time)
Having it on Earth is totally off-concept and risky, and I definitely give you guys kudos for suggesting that.
#124 BB-
It was a blessing, in other words, for Ira Behr & co. to be “left alone,” so to speak, by Paramount in developing DS9, while all the scrutiny and micro-management got focused on VOY and then ENT. Sadly, it showed.
BTW, Brannon, I’m from Cleveland!
Browns Stadium just had to have a thousand defective toilet valves replaced- there was a massive sewage flood a couple of weeks ago. ( gives new meaning to GO Browns..) It’s a classic example of a stadium build by a lowest-bidder consensus.
Just goes to show- the more people involved with a project, the more you’re apt to have QC issues.
Oh, for the movie they should bring Kirk back as a hologram, like Rimmer in Red Dwarf.
Problem solved!
Brannon,
I think having the first season on Earth would have been great. I really like that idea and I think it would have been quite a departure, but a healthy one. It sounds like there were too many cooks in Paramount’s kitchen to allow you to do what you really wanted to. I mean, people were hesitant about DS9 taking place on a space station but ultimately most people seemed to accept it after time (even though they did compromise with the Defiant). Too bad the people behind ENT weren’t willing to be more flexible, concept-wise.
Cool to see you here Mr. Braga.
At first I have to say that I jumped on the bashwagon of you and Mr. Berman too a couple of years ago.
I was young and made the stuff my own that folks were babbling about.
Ah and excuse my sometimes twisted English cause I’m no native speaker and life in Germany.
I was very suprised soon after that that you wrote or co-wrote great TNG episodes like “Parallels”, “All Good Things…”, “Genesis”, “Cause and Effect”, “Frame of Mind”, “Timescape”.
That are episodes which define TNG for me and this are the TNG episodes (among 15 others) which I can still really enjoy.
I don’t like TNG as a whole any more cause the characters are to perfect and a great deal of them is badly acted and 2 dimensional written.
The stories are also too one dimensional -> Our heroes are always right and there is always a safe and convenient day to solve the problem.
So TNG worked best with great sci-fi concepts like your scripts.
As of your later work I have to admit that I skipped “Voyager” almost completely on it’s first run.
It took me a while to get into DS9 but as it happened I was completley sold to that show and didn’t really care about VOY.
I watched Seasons 1-4 a year ago but except “Scorpion”, “Deathwish” and the Herogen stuff there wasn’t anything appealing for me in it.
I guess partly cause of UPN which would not allow you to take chances.
So I have to say for now that I started to be a fan back in 1990 with TNG and grew out of it, took over to DS9 which is still my favorite Trek show only to end up with “Enterprise” after a couple of years Trek pause.
So at the start I hated ENT cause it didn’t catch anything what I visioned for this time period and the Temporal Cold War really drove me of.
As I watched a couple of Episodes soon after it got canned I really appreciated what I was getting.
There was a cool ship out there with some strong characters (in comparison with other Trek shows ;)) improved design, decent stories from the get go (the other modern Trek shows - TNG, DS9 + VOY - were getting good with season 3) and finally more vulcans.
IMO there isn’t one bad season of ENT but they all had there flaws.
The most part of the episodes were good and I didn’t mind the script recycling and the minor cannon stretches much.
Here are my problems with ENT:
- the Temporal Cold War arc was nothing I wanted to see on a show set in this time period. That the whole TCW concept was going nowhere as far as I can see didn’t help either (but as far as I know the TCW was a decission from above)
- the lack of a real story arc or theme to the show
I mean as a Trek fan I enjoyed some standalones but I really like arc based shows and I guess the casual audience wasn’t impressed with a concept of the 1980ties
- holding up the trek core (a positive future) wasn’t a bad thing but in that respect the first two seasons were too much.
It wasn’t really interesting that the guys who are out there first could bubble with every alien (in the most time completley WITHOUT any translation from Hoshi OR any Universal Translator), took out there dog to unexplored planets.
I mean they were representing earth by numerous frist contacts but they have neither a real Ambassador, some Scientists or Military on their ship.
Man I wonder how they could survive that or what the hack they were doing out there in the first place.
- It was Star Trek as usual!
I mean sure it was better in some aspects and everything looked nice BUT come on they have working transporters to beam living organisms?
Wow there is this new Star Trek show that takes place over 200 years before TNG and guess what?
(responese) It is new and fresh?
No dude everything is the same but it looks slightly better…
How the hack was the ship, the crew, the weapons, the aliens and their behavior (except the Vulcans) and lots of other stuff the sam as usual?
I would have really enjoyed if the crew would makes some mistakes with consequences.
Considering that they are the first out there and they aren’t ready for what is coming.
But no they are mostly these super heros which lets every other race to appear stupid.
Sorry, this is getting way too long.
I wanted to say that aside from some serious flaws ENT is my second favorite Trek show and I even liked “Generations” (also besides it flaws it also shines).
Loved “First Contact” - for me it is the second best Trek movie out there after “The Undiscovered Country” - and didn’t actually hate “These are the Voyages” it was a mediocre episode with a good idea and bad execution.
Keep up the good work Mr. Braga and you know… live long and prosper!
i’m from Rome Itally,59.Enterprise’s been best Trek show I ever seen. best cast, best shots,best plots.I never understood why many trekkies didn’t like it. It is a prequel, obviously can’t be like the others. 200 years before TOS the Vulcans can’t be the same of TOS!!! Our world within 50 year is changed! My thought is that many trekkies are narrow–minded!
I’m appalled and stunned by all of the ass-kissing occuring here.
Attempting to mend fences and arrive at some sort of rectification AFTER the fact is slanderous and offensive. Where was the engaging of dialogue with the “fans” WHEN it mattered during production of the various series?
The internet isn’t a NEW resource for obtaining feedback. Things look quite a bit different atop the horse than they do after one has fallen off I daresay. Only now in retrospect once contracts have expired do certain personas find the time and have the inkling to interact.
Why was Moore forced out of Voyager?
Why did you and Moore kill Kirk, how could that have possibly been considered a good idea? Or beneficial? Or advancing the Trek legacy?
Why did yourself and Rick Berman not become INTIMATELY familiar with the source material when creating these spin-off series as Harve Bennett did when producing Wrath of Khan?
Why the dismissive, condescending attitude towards the original series when because of it you and Berman had a paycheck?
Why did you not step aside when you felt you had no more to give creatively rather than meander along half-heartedly producing product you didn’t truly believe in?
Why do you call it “ass kissing”?
I hope my post does not appeaer as such but I guess I’m happy to see one of the most influential writer/producer of modern Trek appear here.
Then considered that there are mostly bash posts and personal threats on the I-net about Mr. Braga (and Mr. Berman) I think it is only fair to give him credit for what I liked.
Grantede VOY wasn’t just a wasted opportunity like ENT - for me it was a nearly complete stinker.
Doesn’t change the fact that I liked “The Andorian Incident”, “Unexpected” (both Braga), “Shuttlepod One” (Berman/Braga) or “The Maguis” (Berman).
Trek could have been so much more BUT
a) we don’t know for sure who was responsible for what specifically and which other factors played in
b) some of Bragas episodes are the best of whole Trek IMO
I personnaly like Moore more for his great character and drama driven scripts but the sci-fi stuff from Braga is as far as I can see unique (known concepts different approach, one that actually works not like most other TNG + VOY attempts)
Good point, Lope. Star Trek encompassed different kinds of stories each week. Some “high concept” sci-fi, others character drama, some political, etc. What’s amazed me over the years is how Trek means different things to different people. And it’s very difficult to satisfy everyone with every episode. Gene Roddenberry likened the show to an anthology of sorts.
Ass-kissing, Josh T? You’d better believe I’m kissing your asses. And I will keep kissing, happily so. Meandering along? A product I didn’t believe in? Man, Josh, I wish you’d been there. We were sprinting at all times to give you the best we had. Me, all the writers, actors, production crew: we committed our lives to that show. We loved it. You may not have liked what we gave you, but you’ve got it all wrong when you acuse me or anyone else of being lazy.
Thanks for your reply Brannon. As i’ve said and other people have said, Mr Braga has delivered some great trek episodes, but everyone seems to only remember the bad ones. 15 years is a long time to devote your life to something, something that not many of us could probably do and so for that reason i think Mr Braga deserves respect and credit for his work. Yes, some episodes were ‘misses’ but he’s admitted to that but the majority were good sci-fi adventures that we could all tune into every week and enjoy, i can’t imagine running such a tv show is easy at all, to make sure things work as they should, so i really don’t think the trek production team have been lazy at all.
Matt
Interesting admissions by Brannon Braga there. The mistake that proved fatal with Enterprise, at least how I saw it, was Berman and Braga’s desire to have the lion’s share of the writing duties. I don’t really consider myself to be among their detractors. Berman in particular is responsible for developing (if not outright inventing) some of my favourite characters, concepts and storylines. So many of the other series were perfected once new blood was brought in. Ira Behr in the case of DS9, although Berman and Piller originated the setting. Part of the reason I wanted to see Manny Coto continue to redirect ENT onto the road of wider acceptance. It