Bryan Fuller Wants Star Trek Back On TV, Angela Bassett In The Captain’s Chair
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Now that Star Trek Into Darkness has come and gone and been furiously argued about, Trek has receded from the limelight just a little bit. No doubt it will kick into full gear again once J.J. Abrams officially confirms or denies that he’ll be directing Trek 3, but in the meantime perhaps it’s time to raise an entirely different subject: Trek making a return to its original home of television. It seems I’m not the only one who’s been dreaming about that, as Hannibalshowrunner Bryan Fuller shared his thoughts about who he’d want in the Captain’s seat a while back.
Fuller, who created such memorable but short-lived shows as Pushing Daisies and Wonderfalls, had actually been trying to get a new Star Trek TV series going last year, collaborating with another Brian: director Brian Singer (X-Men: Days of Future Past). Apparently the two had each been brainstorming a new Trek TV pitch, and eventually decided to pool their resources to try and make it happen. The scuttlebutt at the time was that Fuller and Singer wanted to do a TV spinoff set on the U.S.S. Reliant, presumably still set within the “new” continuity of Abrams’ movies. Unfortunately, Fuller later said that, with the franchise focused on Abrams’ big-screen adventures, the TV series was probably a non-starter, at least for the time-being.
But that was a year ago, and Abrams’ future involvement with the Star Trek franchise is very much up in the air. Even if he remains on as a producer while shifting his focus to Star Wars: Episode VII, it would mean a new director for Trek — a new creative direction — which sounds like a perfect time to bring the franchise back to the small screen as well. Whether it followed the adventures of the Reliant or something else entirely, it could help entice back long-time Trekkies who didn’t like Abrams’ movie take on Gene Roddenberry’s universe. Trek on the small screen could return to the more high-minded, humanistic, philosophical storytelling of the franchise’s roots, which the films could continue to serve up Abrams’ action-oriented brand.
Speaking with Den of Geek back in April, Fuller confirmed that his Trek series is still in limbo at this point. Fuller actually has a background in Star Trek, having worked on both Deep Space Nine and Voyager. He told Den of Geek he would still love to return to the Trek universe at some point, and even elaborated a bit on his Reliant idea:
Yeah, I think let [the adventures of the Enterprise] be the movies and let that be their story. I would love to do something on the Reliant. I want Angela Lansbury…Not Lansbury! I want Angela Bassett to be the captain, that’s who I would love to have, you know Captain Angela Bassett and First Officer Rosario Dawson. I would love to do that version of the show and but that’s in the future to be told.
What do you think? Would you tune in for Fuller’s Reliant series if it came to be? Then again, even if he wanted to return to Trek, Fuller’s got a full schedule these days…
